InterBeaujolais aims to attract young winegrowers with funding project

By Lisa Riley

Published: 29 October, 2018

InterBeaujolais has revealed it is working on a new project aimed at attracting young and new winegrowers to the region.

Still in its “very early” days, the ‘incubator’ project will - if it takes off, focus on helping young and new winegrowers getting established in the region, said Jean Bourjade, managing director, InterBeaujolais.

“If we achieve this, to launch the project, it will mean that young winegrowers could get help getting started up and then once they have reached maturity, they would leave the ‘incubator’ and fly with their own wings,” he said.

Beaujolais was doing “everything it could” as a region to try and attract young and new winemakers to settle in the region, he added.

With the initiative still in its “early early days”, it would take at least a couple of years to get underway “if it happens”, he said.

“We will as the regional trade body put some money in but we haven’t got the funds to fund it so we are going to set up a system by which people can contribute and get tax free returns, like when they invest in art or new monuments, and that takes time to build up.”

InterBeaujolais may also look to use co-funding for the project, said Bourjade.

“With the project still in its infancy it’s very much open but we want to do everything we can to favour the younger installation - we want to be a really welcoming area for all young and new winegrowers from all over the place because they are the future of Beaujolais,” he said.

A great advantage for Beaujolais was that it was still easy to find affordable vineyards to buy compare to the other AOC regions of France - “a very strong argument for young winegrowers to come to Beaujolais”, he added.

At the beginning of this month, InterBeaujolais announced a “legendary vintage” for the 2018 harvest.

Printer friendly version