The announcement surprised more than one. The famous brand of chocolate drink Cacolac, installed since its creation almost seventy years ago in the Gironde, should inaugurate, in the summer of 2022, its first factory entirely dedicated to canning … wine.
Canned wine? Suffice to say that for part of Bordeaux, this project is heresy. And too bad if, since 2012, the family group has already discreetly sold around five million cans of wine per year, mainly in the United States. “Without doing more advertising than that, because we do not have the capacity to respond favorably to demand when there is enormous potential in this market”, specifies Christian Maviel, the CEO of the company.
This one has in mind the development of hard seltzer, these low-alcohol carbonated drinks which are all the rage in the United States, but also simple cans of wine, with packaging that attracts consumers who are younger than fans of the traditional great Bordeaux wines.
“China, England, the Scandinavian countries are interested, but, for a year, a year and a half, we also have a customer who sells in France. Its range has been referenced by Carrefour, the boss continues. Hence the factory project. Either we were satisfied to fill 98% or 99% of the occupancy time of our current site and we stopped there, or we believed in these new products and we created a new line dedicated exclusively to this type of drink. “
Diversification
The first cans should come out before the end of next year thanks to ten or fifteen specially hired people. The objective will be to initially produce around twenty million cans per year, then, “By speeding up a little, with a little more people and two teams, we can go up to forty million”, enthuses Christian Maviel.
“It is better for young people to drink wine or a product made from grapes than beer” Bernard Farges, winegrower
A great diversification for the group. If the first chocolate drink of Cacolac was born in 1954, the family dairy was installed in Bénauge, on the right bank of Bordeaux, at the end of the 19th century.e century. Over the years, the company grew, and from the end of the 1970s, the famous aluminum can supplied to supermarkets.
At the start of 2000, the Bordeaux factory was relocated to a larger site in Léognan, about twenty kilometers from Bordeaux. In 2015, the company belonging to the industrial holding company Trixaim Investissements was bought by Bernard Maviel and his son Christian, descendants of the founders.
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