A Visit to La Tour Saint-Martin, 2016: A Brief History
La Tour Saint-Martin is clearly a family property, as evinced by the presence of the Minchin family residence in one corner of this collection of buildings. Bertrand joined his parents in their work back in 1988, although at this time the domaine was very different to how it is now. His father’s focus was purely on growing fruit, all of which was sold directly to négociants. After his arrival Bertrand naturally continued this for a few years, but with time he realised he wanted to change things, in particular to begin vinifying the fruit for himself, bottling and selling what wine he made.
Bertrand’s first vinifications were in 1994, at which time he was working with about 12 hectares of vines (today the domaine has grown to about 17 hectares). His objective was to vinify everything he grew on the domaine by 2000, so the last few years of the 20th century were a period of rapid change for La Tour Saint-Martin. Suddenly Bertrand had a lot of wine on his hands, and therefore he needed to find a lot of clients to whom he could sell it. Fortunately for Bertrand (pictured) and his new venture, this was something he achieved without too much difficulty. I can not help but suppose that Bertrand’s ebullient, gregarious and outgoing nature helped him in this task.
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