Text Patrícia Leite 

We often associate a wine company to a producing unit that has a wine estate with vineyards and a winery. Even though this is true for most cases, the fact is that the company we see identified on a bottle can be the company that produces the wine, but not the grapes, or it may even just have bottled the wine.

Main Categories

Several economic activities can be performed in the Portuguese wine sector, such as producing, bottling or buying/selling wine, in bulk or bottled. It is the Portuguese law, through Decree-Law no. 178/99, of 21st May, which defines the categories of economic operators in accordance with those activities and determines the mandatory character of the respective registration in the Instituto da Vinha e do Vinho, I.P. (IVV). This regime does not apply to the operators that are exclusively devoted to the production or trade of Port Wine or to the Autonomous Regions of Azores and Madeira.

Decreto-Lei nº178/99

The main categories of economic operators listed in the national law are the following: Engarrafador (Bottler), Armazenista (Wholesaler), Produtor (Producer), Vitivinicultor (Wine Estate Producer) and Vitivinicultor-Engarrafador (Wine Estate Producer-Bottler).

The activity of an Engarrafador (Bottler) is to conduct or order the bottling in a service rendering regime, assuming itself as the sole responsible for the product.

An Armazenista (Wholesaler) conducts wholesale trade (purchase/sale) of wine, in bulk or bottled.

A Produtor (Producer) produces wine from grapes of its own wine estate or from grapes purchased elsewhere. It is included in this category the activity conducted by the wine cooperatives, which produce wine from grapes they receive from their members.

The category of Vitivinicultor (Wine Estate Producer) also corresponds to wine production but only from grapes exclusively grown in the wine estate of the economic operator, thus not being allowed to buy grapes.

In turn, a Vitivinicultor-Engarrafador (Wine Estate Producer-Bottler) practices this last activity and also bottles the wine it produces in its own facilities or in the facilities of another economic operator, in a service rendering agreement. As Engarrafador (Bottler), it is also the sole responsible for the product.

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Accumulation of categories

Economic operators should be registered at the IVV in the several categories corresponding to the activities they wish to conduct, being exempt from registration the Wine Estate Producers and Producers with a production volume inferior to 4000 litres of wine per year.

This means that the categories can be accumulated, except when there are incompatibilities due to the nature of the category itself:
a) it is not possible to conduct the activity of Wine Estate Producer or Wine Estate Producer-Bottler with the activities of Wholesaler and Producer;
b) it is also not possible to accumulate the category of Wine Estate Producer-Bottler with the categories of Wine Estate Producer or Bottler.

Since the Bottler is the sole responsible for the product, it is up to this economic operator to request the certification of the wine to the respective certifying bodies. On the other hand, the category of Bottler is many times conducted cumulatively with the categories of Wholesaler and/or Producer, which can frequently be seen in economic operators of greater dimension.
It should be pointed out that one cannot be a Bottler and a Wine Estate Producer-Bottler at the same time, since the latter can only bottle the wine it produces.

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Other categories

There are five other categories, which are more specific regarding the activity or the product: Destilador (Distiller), Fabricante de Vinagre de Vinho (Wine Vinegar Producer), Preparador (Preparation Operator), Exportador/Importador (Exporter/Importer) and Retalhista (Retailer).

Whereas the categories of Distiller and Wine Vinegar Producer describe the specific activity in the name itself, the category of Preparador (Preparation Operator) refers the operator that obtains products ready to be consumed, from wine, wine derivatives and winemaking sub-products (such as Sparkling Wine).

In turn, an operator can be registered as an Exporter/Importer if it wishes to buy or sell directly to third countries wine products in bulk or bottled.

The category of Retailer is foreseen to conduct the direct sale to the consumer of packaged or pre-packaged wine products, but the law has exempted these economic operators from registration in the IVV.

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And the grape producers, the Viticultores?
Decree-Law no. 178/99 does not foresee the exclusive production of grapes as an economic category, including this activity in the wine production conducted by Wine Estate Producers and Wine Estate Producers-Bottlers and by Producers regarding wine produced from the their own grapes. To be part of the wine economic circuit, the grapes produced by Viticultores are sold or provided to Producers, the only economic operators (natural persons, companies or cooperatives) that can buy grapes to produce wine.

Mandatory category on the bottle

In accordance with the European and Portuguese rules, it is mandatory the reference on the wine labeling to the name and address of the Bottler, preceded by the term «engarrafador» (bottler) or «engarrafado por» (bottled by) or, in the case of Sparkling Wine, «preparador» (preparation operator) or «preparado por» (prepared by).

However, appearing on the label the identification of an entity that takes part in the wine commercial circuit in addition to the Bottler, this operator name may be replaced by a code (number attributed by the IVV), preceded by the term «Eng. No.».

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Therefore, if the bottle only includes the identification of the operator which bottled the wine, we will only know who produced it if there are included other indications that provide us with that information. Let’s look at the case of an economic operator registered as a Wholesaler, Producer and Bottler:
a) it can have purchased and bottled a certain wine, acting for that product as a Wholesaler and Bottler;
b) it can be the Producer of another wine, with grapes from its own estate, and the respective Bottler;
c) and it can also produce a third wine, with purchased grapes, and bottle it.

The truth is that the category which provides in itself more information on the bottle is the Vitivinicultor-Engarrafador (Wine Estate Producer-Bottler): it lets us know that who bottled the wine was the one that produced the grapes and the wine.