Latest news with #Cinzano
Forbes
2 days ago
- Business
- Forbes
A New Wine With An Old History, CMC Conti Marone Cinzano Brunello Di Montalcino
Santiago Marone Cinzano of Col d'Orcia and CMC, Brunello di Montalcino, Tuscany, copyright BKWine Photography BKWine Photography The Cinzano family has a long history in Brunello di Montalcino in Tuscany. Some 50 years ago, Francesco Marone Cinzano acquired the Col d'Orcia, one of the region's leading estates with a solid international reputation. Francesco's son, Santiago Cinzano, who has for many years been involved in running the estate, has recently launched a new project that is, in some ways, a move back to the roots of the family and, in other ways, points to a different future: the launch of 'CMC Conti Marone Cinzano Lot 1, 2019'. This is still a Brunello di Montalcino, but a very different one, perhaps a more modern one. At the same time, it brings back, after 50 years, the name Marone Cinzano on the label. Earlier this year, I had the opportunity to sit down and talk to Santiago about his new venture. It is easy to understand why this would feel like a momentous step. Cinzano is almost a 'household' name in the drinks business; it's the name of one of the world's most famous vermouths. The vermouth house, including the rights to the Cinzano brand and name, was owned by the family but was sold in the late 1980s, early 1990s. As a result, the Brunello di Montalcino has not used the family name since. The wine that Francesco Marrone Cinzano makes at the family estate in Tuscany has always gone under the name Col d'Orcia. Barriques and botti in the cellar of Col d'Orcia, Montalcino, Tuscany, copyright BKWine Photography BKWine Photography The sale of the company was not an easy thing for the young Francesco Marone Cinzano, Santiago told me. For Santiago, launching this brand is obviously a very emotional step, as he told me about his personal history of it: 'When I was a young kid growing up in Chile, I didn't really know what had happened with Cinzano. But I knew it was us, because in the house I saw paintings of Cinzano's old logos, ashtrays… And in the supermarket, I remember maybe seven, eight years old, the first time I see a Cinzano bottle — I grab it and I put it in the cart. I'm with my father, and I see my father's face go white, and he says, 'No, I don't want to see that. Please take it away.' And then I started thinking, there's something there that was probably a sad story, something that was very difficult for him.' So, maybe, Santiago says, that moving the family to Chile was perhaps a way to get away from the memory of having to sell the company: 'Ultimately, I believe that's part of why he moved to Chile, kind of to get away from a whole situation that was very hurtful for him, and when I noticed how much it hurt him, I knew I wanted one day as a dedication to my father, to reclaim the name.' But how? The vermouth and the brand, the name, are now owned by Campari. The lawyers that Santiago spoke to said that it is quite impossible to use the Cinzano name in any connection with wines and spirits. What was there to do? Santiago talked to his lawyer and said, 'What if I go speak to Luca Garavoglia, the owner of Campari? Tell him about my desire, my dream, my project, and see how he reacts.' Santiago decided to go to Milan and arrange a meeting with Garavoglia. 'We went to lunch. I spoke about the project, and he told me, 'As long as Cinzano is mine, I will not complicate your life in any way. So please feel free.' We shook our hands. He asked me to send him a bottle for Christmas, and that's how I got the chance to use what I ultimately decided to stylise at CMC, to make it short and memorable. So Conti Marone Cinzano, the family brand.' CMC Conti Marone Cinzano Lot 1 2019, Brunello di Montalcino from Tuscany and Col d'Orcia, copyright BKWine Photography BKWine Photography Earlier this year, Santiago Marone Cinzano released the very first vintage of Conti Marone Cinzano CMC Lot 1, 2019, called, of course, 'Lot 1', released in 9944 bottles. To understand what this wine is, we need to get back to the range of wines that Col d'Orcia produces today. Starting with the 'basic' regional wines called IGT, for example, IGT Toscana, they move up to Rosso di Montalcino DOC and then the most prestigious DOCG Brunello di Montalcino. On top of the pyramid, they have the single vineyard Poggio al Vento DOCG Brunello di Montalcino Riserva, which they don't make every year (depending on the quality of the grapes), but always comes from the same plot. The CMC is different. It is, in a way, a parallel to the Poggio al Vento, also being a prestige cuvée at the top of the quality pyramid, but with a very different logic. It does not come from the same plot every year, so it does not have a vineyard name on the label. The family owns some 100 hectares of sangiovese vineyards in Brunello di Montalcino. Every year, they sample and analyse every different patch of vineyard to see what it gives 'this year'. The performance of each patch varies from year to year due to exposure, weather, and numerous other factors. 'We know very well that every vintage has a specific plot that is the best,' says Santiago. One year, it might be a plot high up on a hill with rich, clay soil. Another year, it can be one with more sand, with a different sun exposure. This 'best' plot of the year is what makes Conti Marone Cinzano CMC. It is also different from the Poggio al Vento in that the CMC will be released every year. There is always a 'best' plot every year. The Poggio, on the other hand, is not made in very difficult years, for example, 2017 and 2018, when the grape material is not quite up to what Marone Cinzano wants Poggio al Vento to be. Instead, it then goes into the 'regular' Brunello. Col d'Orcia Poggio al Vento Brunello di Montalcino riserva 2016 from Tuscany, copyright BKWine Photography BKWine Photography So, is then CMC better than Poggio al Vento? Well, that depends on what you mean by 'better' and on what your personal preferences are. The two wines are certainly different. Poggio al Vento is more 'traditional' and CMC is more 'modern'. Santiago explains that this is intentional, 'I wanted to produce a Brunello that had two main aspects that are important for me: very silky tannin, very velvety tannin, because I see that my generation doesn't love very tannic wines when they're not mature enough, so, very high phenolic maturation and 50% of polymerisation of tannins before going in the bottle, AND very fruit forward. If I tell the story that this is a selection of the best fruit of the season, then I want the fruit to be the protagonist. And on the nose, red fruit is very much the protagonist.' And yes, it is a very different wine. It is made in a different way than the Col d'Orcia wines. Santiago is actually making the SMC wines as a separate business. And it will be distributed and sold in a different manner. But even so, if you want to experience the subtleties and variations of Brunello di Montalcino wines, I'd suggest that you try them both and compare. They are not only excellent wines but they also give you an illustration of the importance of the hand of the winemaker and a glimpse into the trends of a changing wine market. Read more on Col d'Orcia in this Forbes article: Brunello Di Montalcino From Col D'Orcia: Elegant Wines And Important Research On Climate Change . —Per Karlsson
Yahoo
26-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Campari sells Cinzano to Caffo Group 1915
Campari is offloading vermouth brand Cinzano to fellow Italian distiller Caffo Group 1915 for €100m ($117.2m). The Aperol owner has been prepared to sell 'non-core' assets to devote more resources to brands the company deems have stronger prospects. Under the terms of the deal, Caffo Group 1915, the owner of the bitters brand Vecchio Amaro del Capo, is also buying Cinzano's sparkling wines, as well as the Frattina grappa and sparkling wine business. Campari CEO Simon Hunt, who joined the group in January, said: 'The sale of Cinzano vermouth and sparkling wines and Frattina businesses marks a key step in our strategy of streamlining our portfolio via disposals, allowing us to increase our commercial and marketing focus on our key core brands.' In October, after a set of third-quarter results that missed forecasts, the Appleton rum owner set out plans to cut costs and sell non-core brands. Campari wants to provide more resources to its 'core priority brands', which sit under four Houses of Brands – the House of Aperitifs, House of Whiskey and Rum, House of Tequila and House of Cognac & Champagne. Last year, Cinzano and Frattina generated combined net sales of €75m, Campari said. Group net sales reached €3.07bn in 2024. The company pointed to the assets' 5% CAGR over the last four years. The deal with Caffo Group 1915 excludes production facilities in Italy and Argentina, where Campari also manufactures other brands. The companies expect the transaction to be finalised by the end of the year. They will then enter into a 'transitional manufacturing agreement' in Italy and Argentina and temporary distribution deals that will see Campari handle Cinzano products in markets including Argentina, Spain, Mexico, Russia, South Korea and South Africa. Caffo Group 1915 CEO Sebastiano Caffo described the acquisition as 'an important step in our international growth journey'. He added: 'Cinzano, a historic and iconic brand, will be pivotal to accelerate our international expansion, expanding immediately our footprint in more than 100 markets. We believe that our long-standing experience in alcoholic beverages and our consolidated and far-reaching sales network will enable us to fully exploit the brands potential, starting with their relaunch in Italy.' "Campari sells Cinzano to Caffo Group 1915" was originally created and published by Just Drinks, a GlobalData owned brand. The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site.
Reuters
26-06-2025
- Business
- Reuters
Italy's Campari to sell Cinzano and Frattina brands for 100 million euros
MILAN, June 26 (Reuters) - Italian spirits group Campari ( opens new tab has agreed to sell its Cinzano vermouth and Frattina grappa brands to domestic rival Caffo Group 1915 for 100 million euros ($117 million), it said on Thursday. The deal is part of Campari's efforts to streamline its brand portfolio by selling non-core items to focus on its core spirits business and reduce debt. Both Cinzano and Frattina include also a sparkling wine production alongside the vermouth and grappa which the two brands, respectively, are famous for. In 2024 net sales of Cinzano and Grappa Frattina amounted to 75 million euros and accounted for 2% of Campari's overall net sales. ($1 = 0.8550 euros)
Chicago Tribune
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Column: How ‘Breaking Away' helped a newbie cyclist conquer his inner critic
The right sports movie can really do a number on you. It can maneuver around cliches, resistance points and aversions to string-pulling to win the big race against your more skeptical instincts. The right sports movie, even if it's not great, has wily ways of inspiring us to do something, try something, go somewhere we haven't yet. It can bend us, at least a little, into a new, in-progress variation of the person we were the last time we checked. But it's usually not immediate. Movies tend to roll around in your head, half-remembered, for decades. And then it's there again, when you need it. Last weekend, for example. Last weekend, the 1979 charmer 'Breaking Away,' nominally about cycling but about much more, glided out of the mists of time to push me up another series of hills on the second day of a three-day, two-night bike-packing trip out of Lower Manhattan, up through the Bronx, past Yonkers, into rural New York State and then into a lovely bit of Connecticut. And back again. Movie first, personal experience later. Forty-six summers ago, 'Breaking Away' came out in theaters. It started slowly, not a hit, but it built an audience week by week and became one. Such things were possible then. Director Peter Yates, best known as an action director ('Bullitt'), wasn't a likely choice for the material but he turned out to be good for it. The screenplay by playwright and screenwriter Steve Tesich won the Oscar; it dealt with four recent working-class high school graduates living in Bloomington, Indiana, in the shadow of Indiana University and in a state of uncertainty regarding their own futures. Tesich basically combined two of his unfilmed scripts set in Bloomington and came up with 'Bambino,' retitled 'Breaking Away.' Dennis Christopher, beautifully cast and, on a recent rewatch, even better than I remembered, played Dave Stohler, the cycling enthusiast besotted with all things Italian, from grand opera to scraps of handbook Italian phrases. ('Buongiorno!' he calls out to a perplexed neighbor as he rides by.) His doleful father, portrayed by Paul Dooley in a magically right match of performer and material, despairs for his blithely romantic son's future. Barbara Barrie, nominated for an Academy Award, plays Dave's fond, supportive mother. Dave and his friends spend their summer days hanging out at the limestone quarry, ragging on each other, cliff-jumping into the water, wondering what sort of lives await them. The big race in 'Breaking Away' happens when the Italian cyclists sponsored by Cinzano agree to come to Indianapolis to compete. This race gives Dave the setback his story requires, prior to the climactic 'Little 500' race back in Bloomington. Dave and his cohorts, the 'cutters,' aka the townies in a town built on working-class stone cutters' labor, square off on wheels against the privileged IU fraternity racers. Is the movie a classic? Friends, that is so very much up to you. Few things in life are touchier or more prone to argument than the topic of favorite sports movies. What I liked about 'Breaking Away,' back when I was a year out of college, and again on a rewatch the other day, had everything to do with a very simple matter, described aptly by one sub-Reddit poster as 'the simple joy of riding a bike.' The poster added: 'But if that doesn't sound interesting, it isn't worth a watch.' To which another Reddit poster countered: 'Well, I have zero interest in bike riding and I loved this movie.' 'Breaking Away' keeps its tensions between townies and university students relatively uncomplicated, but as Christopher told PBS NewsHour in 2019, 'There this lesson in it about class struggle, and you never see stories like that anymore. There's a story about how the father and mother grow closer together through this eccentric child. And there's a story about how all the male characters are examples of male doubt at this particular time in their lives.' Last weekend I joined a dear friend on her second bike-packing trip with the terrific Brooklyn, New York outfit 718 Outdoors, run by a former architect and bike shop proprietor Joe Nocella. My friend is a lifelong jock ('and so much more!' she states, for the record) and I am not. I learned a few things on the trip. I learned that 'training' for even a modest 130-mile excursion, which in my case meant not training enough, will probably work better if I train without the quotation marks. I learned that bike-packing, which means carrying a lot of stuff in pannier bags on your bike, takes some effort. Some of that is mental. I learned that various forms of adversity on the first, 58-mile day provoked an interior debate conducted by my inner pessimist (), my inner realist () and my inner stoic optimist (). I overpacked by 30-40%. On day one, I scraped the side of a stone pathway marker hard enough yet slowly enough to detach, in a permanent way, one of the pannier's buckles. Also, I treated the bottom hook attachment as an unnecessary backup, which was the wishful thinking of a newbie. But I learned this, too, so very gratefully: Our tour group of 20 or so, of all ages, from all over the globe by ancestry and all over New York City by residency, plus me, from Chicago, met every challenge in their individual ways. A typical number of flat tires; some wonky rack problems; hills too much for some of us, leading to pushing the bikes up the rest of the way on foot. These things happen, and they happened. On day three I had some of the finest medically untrained minds in the country performing emergency surgery on my broken spoke. They got me going again, and back to New York City. And, separately, the riders who teamed up to MacGyver my busted pannier with a complex and delicate array of straps, bungee cords and inner tubes came up with a group art installation worthy of serious critical praise. 'A thing of ugly beauty' One of my former (and best) Tribune editors, Kevin Williams, now lives in Porto, Portugal, where he allegedly takes it easier than he used to in Chicago in terms of his maniacal yet stylish devotion to high-intensity cycling. I asked him if cycling held any life lessons for him, and how riding on two wheels might have informed other parts of his life. His reply, in part: 'The weight room, the place I used to make my cycling better, had different lessons, or more like a notion. Which essentially was, 'After you do this, nothing else you do today will be as hard.'' The bike-packing last weekend was hard, and great, and the communal cookout around the fire on night two went on for several wonderful hours, just before the frogs near the campsite in Connecticut started croaking. Stray images from 'Breaking Away' rode with me the whole time. As the miles piled up, I resembled a young Daniel Stern, a little too big and a lotta too gangly for his own bike. But at the end of it all, I felt like Dennis Christopher, hoisting his team's trophy at the end of the movie.
Yahoo
03-03-2025
- Lifestyle
- Yahoo
Meet the Young Aristocrat That's Making Brunello Cool Again
This story is from an installment of The Oeno Files, our weekly insider newsletter to the world of fine wine. Sign up here. Thirty-year-old vintner Santiago Cinzano has just launched a new estate called Conti Marone Cinzano, where he is pioneering an unorthodox viticultural philosophy: selecting the best plot in any given vintage to create his wine, Lot.1 Brunello di Montalcino. Due to increasing climatic unpredictability, the plot changes every year and is selected during the ripening season based on the year's conditions and their influence on the vines. After realizing that members of his age group prefer other styles of wine to age-worthy Brunello with potentially hefty tannins, Cinzano launched his project with an eye toward making Brunello cool again. More from Robb Report $2.2 Million Worth of Ancient Artifacts Trafficked Through New York Are Returning to Greece and Italy Spring-Break Travel Prices Have Hit a Record High This Year How to Sell a Bottle of Wine From Your Collection The 10th generation of a winemaking dynasty whose surname is more closely associated with Vermouth and Asti Spumante than red wine, Cinzano notes that his friends prefer to drink styles such as Beaujolais, Trousseau from Jura, and crisp, fresh reds from the slopes of Mount Etna rather than what they consider an overly tannic red that may not be ready to drink for another 10 years. 'Don't get me wrong—I know that today Brunello's reputation is at an all-time high,' Cinzano says. 'But people my age want to drink cool wines. Montalcino, Brunello, today, they are not cool. They're prestigious. They're high end. They're historical. They're classic. But Brunello is not considered cool by 25- to 30-year-olds.' Ten years ago, Cinzano's father, Count Francesco Marone Cinzano, ceded 10 percent of the land owned by his Montalcino wine estate Col d'Orcia to Santiago and his brother to begin a project of their own. At that time, this portion of the estate had been planted with fields of grain, olive groves, and forests, which Santiago replaced with Sangiovese planted in bush-vine style. The elder Cinzano had sold the remaining 50 percent of his family's eponymous Vermouth and sparkling-wine brand when his own father died in a car accident in 1989, and his son's first line item in starting a new project was to use his family name on the bottle, which was easier said than done. The sale of Cinzano was a painful end to an illustrious family legacy dating back to 1757, and while Santiago wanted to reclaim the name, multiple legal consultants and attorneys told him it would be impossible. Unbeknown to Francesco, Santiago set up a meeting in Milan with Luca Garavoglia, chairman of Campari Group, the current owner of Cinzano. 'I presented this project, and he told me, 'As long as Campari owns Cinzano, I will never make your life difficult. Send me a bottle for Christmas. Please, use your family name, feel free,'' he says. And thus Conti Marone Cinzano was born, for which Santiago often uses the shorthand CMC. With his family name back in play, it was important to him to take a personal, intimate approach to every aspect of winemaking from vineyard to bottle, including his and Francesco's signature on the label and hand-numbering each bottle. Because his 10-year-old vineyard is not producing grapes of the quality necessary for such a special project, CMC Lot.1 is currently reliant on the vines of Col d'Orcia, where 272 acres are planted at 500 to almost 1,500 feet above sea level with many different expositions and multiple soil types. The vineyard has been broken down into micro-parcels so that the team can understand each and every plot as deeply as possible. Working closely with enologist Dr. Donato Lanati of Giacomo Conterno and Giuseppe Mascarello fame, Cinzano's Lot.1 is a single-vineyard wine, but it will not be from the same plot each vintage. 'In the past eight years we've seen the warmest year on record, the driest year on record, and the rainiest autumn on record,' Santiago says. 'We are seeing such a level of climatic variability and unpredictability that the concept of having to rely on a single plot is becoming less and less reliable.' With that in mind, Lanati analyzes grapes samples just after veraison, which indicates the onset of ripening. He is looking for aromatic precursors that at that point cannot be smelled or tasted in the grape; they are released only during fermentation. Lanati examines the grapes prior to full ripening and can predict the evolution of aromas, thereby choosing the best plots weeks before harvest and then narrowing it down to just one. 'When we are harvesting that parcel, we go even further, and it's a selection of the best bunches from that already selected parcel,' he says. 'The parameters allow me to do very short maceration and very delicate pump overs to have a fresh, approachable wine, but at the same time I can extract a lot of aromas.' Seeking to release a wine that's age-worthy yet still approachable, Santiago and Lanati's goal is a 'Brunello that even in its first year of release has tannins that are extremely integrated, extremely silky, and extremely round,' Lanati says. Cinzano's 2019 Lot.1 is derived from what he calls a 'textbook vintage.' Sourced from the estate's almost 40-year-old Canneto vineyard, the wine benefited from 'near perfect equilibrium' in its soil composition. 'The limestone, clay, and sandy components have great balance, which in a vintage like 2019, where you didn't need the most draining soil or the most retentive soil, you go for a very balanced soil,' he says. The plot's southern exposure and ample sunlight brought on perfect phenolic ripeness, which is necessary to make great wine. The entire lot was aged in a single large wooden tank called a botte and was transferred to bottle in August 2023. Conti Marone Cinzano 2019 Lot.1 Brunello di Montalcino is deep garnet in the glass and has a bouquet of cranberry, pomegranate, cherry, and vanilla with touches of saddle leather and tobacco leaf. Flavors of ripe summer cherry and dried cranberry are wrapped in brilliant acidity and polished tannins shot through with a bold vein of minerality. Shimmering acidity lingers into the drawn-out finish. If this wine doesn't make Brunello cool again, we wonder if anything will. Do you want access to rare and outstanding reds from Napa Valley? Join the Robb Report 672 Wine Club today. Best of Robb Report Why a Heritage Turkey Is the Best Thanksgiving Bird—and How to Get One 9 Stellar West Coast Pinot Noirs to Drink Right Now The 10 Best Wines to Pair With Steak, From Cabernet to Malbec Click here to read the full article.
