As part of Bordeaux Mentor Week, we were delighted to welcome Jane Anson for an exceptional day dedicated to innovation in the wine world, entrepreneurship and the future of wine 🍷
A leading figure in Bordeaux wine, Jane Anson is a renowned British journalist, author, columnist and wine critic. Based in Bordeaux since 2003, she is renowned throughout the industry for her many years of service as Bordeaux correspondent for the famous Decanter magazine. A true entrepreneur, she has since developed her own media via her website janeanson.com since 2021. For the 4th year running, Jane is organizing a mentoring program called "Bordeaux Mentor Week", enabling selected international wine talents to experience a week-long total immersion in the Bordeaux vineyards. This 4th promotion includes sommeliers, sales and marketing staff from all over the world: India, Malawi, Kenya, California, China, Brazil and Rwanda!
The day began with a talk by Chinedu Rita Rosa, who presented her Africa Wine Week program. She shared an interesting vision of the considerable potential that the African market represents for the wine sector, highlighting the continent's burgeoning economic, cultural and entrepreneurial dynamics.
A unique tasting of the Bordeaux grape varieties of 2050
The day was also an opportunity to present the visionary "La Tour Carnet 2050" project launched by Bernard Magrez, aimed at identifying the most promising grape varieties for the future of Bordeaux wine in the face of climate change by 2050.
Since 2013, the Vignobles Bernard Magrez scientific center has planted a private collection of over 91 grape varieties, including some formerly grown in the Bordeaux region known as "forgotten" varieties, and others from Mediterranean vineyards. The aim of this plant heritage is to identify the grape varieties "of tomorrow" that could thwart these future climatic hazards while preserving the aromatic signature of great Bordeaux wines by entering the blend.
To complete this approach, the ORACLE La Tour Carnet - Bordeaux 2050 project facilities are complemented by a dedicated vinification vat room, with temperature-controlled tanks for separate vinification of each of the grape varieties in the study.
Producing tomorrow's wine on a great Médoc terroir since 2022 illustrates Bernard Magrez's determination never to give up innovating to guarantee the quality of our wines.
Participants had the unique opportunity to taste two vintages (2022 & 2023) and two grape varieties (Arinarnoa & Duras) from the La Tour Carnet 2050 project, a tasting moderated by Augustin LACAILLE, Deputy Managing Director of Maison Bernard Magrez.
An inspiring look at the journey of an American entrepreneur
The afternoon closed with a fascinating talk by Onyeka OBIOCHA, founder of Palm Wine, who shared his international experience and valuable advice on the art of pitching, developing ideas and building sustainable ecosystems.
"As you build a business, look to work with the people to your left and to your right... The worst thing is to get to the top on your own. As you build, always look to take people with you." - Onyeka Obecha
Our start-ups are shaping tomorrow's wine
Throughout the day, our start-ups had the opportunity to pitch their projects in English to an international jury of wine industry professionals from all over the world.
Congratulations to the entrepreneurs who took up the challenge:
- yobe, designed by Corentin NOCTON's Niram Consulting, is an innovative wireless illuminated POP solution for illuminating and highlighting bottles and other transparent containers in bars, restaurants, shop windows, trade shows, tasting rooms and other points of sale. With its elegant design and modular charger, yobe combines aesthetics and durability to enhance your products in a responsible way.
- GrapeTrack, founded by Daniel BERUBEN and Guillaume MARIN, responds to the new European regulation EU2021/2117, which requires winemakers to display nutritional values via QR codes on their back labels. Thanks to an automated solution developed in partnership with analysis laboratories, the GrapeTrack platform facilitates the calculation of energy values and the creation of QR codes, meeting the needs of a market of 3 million winemakers and almost 1,000 laboratories in Europe carrying out between 10,000 and 50,000 analyses per year. Innovative and multilingual, GrapeTrack transforms a regulatory constraint into an opportunity for the entire industry.
- Surus Connect, founded by Eliot DUPRE, is a safety tool for agricultural and viticultural workers. In France, agricultural workers report almost 70,000 work-related accidents every year. Surus Connest is a hybrid solution between a wireless emergency stop system and a lone worker alarm. Using the user's smartphone, Surus Connect functions can be activated both manually and automatically when a dangerous situation is identified.
- Oenoco, led by Laura STELZ and Margaux POISSON, aims to reinvent the deposit system for more sustainable wine. Oenoco is committed to reducing the wine industry's carbon footprint by tackling glass bottles, which are responsible for 40% of a winery's CO2 emissions. The start-up designs innovative solutions to reintroduce deposits into the wine world, acting across the entire value chain. From raising winemakers' awareness to a range of reusable glass bottles, Oenoco is also developing smart crates, designed to optimize storage and reduce logistics and transport costs.
- Opack, developed by Chrystelle PELLETIER, revolutionizes packaging for sustainable e-commerce. Faced with the environmental challenge posed by the 1.7 billion parcels sent each year in France, generating 300,000 tonnes of waste and 1 million tonnes of CO2, Opack is developing a reusable, cost-effective solution, a genuine alternative to cardboard and single-use overpackaging. Their innovation: an inflatable cushioning system combined with a flexible, robust bag, designed to be used up to 100 times, and a business model that encourages reuse. The system reduces waste by 99% and CO2 emissions linked to logistics by up to 80%.
- Montclair Tech aims to improve dealcoholized wines through aroma recovery based on a patented innovation, developed by Jürgen NEISIUS, that transforms the wine fermentation process by recovering aromas from fermentation gases. This unique process, combining condensation and absorption, offers unrivalled efficiency and flexibility for a variety of wine styles. The applications are manifold: improving the taste of dealcoholized wines, customizing aromatic profiles, and reducing alcohol content while preserving aromas.
🏆 After the jury votes, Chrystelle PELLETIER (Opack) stood out and won the Business Game thanks to her innovative recyclable packaging project for the wine industry and beyond.
A huge thank you to all those involved: start-ups, speakers and participants in Bordeaux Mentor Week.
This day fully embodies the future of wine, between climate adaptation, entrepreneurial innovation and a new generation of talents who will shape the future of the sector in the four corners of the world 🌎