QUATRO CRAVOS
Quatro Cravos produces high quality wines with Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) Bairrada and Geographical Identification (GI) Beira Atlântico.
Sociedade Agrícola Quatro Cravos manages the wineries Adega Cravo, Adega Original and PositiveWine, adding wine tourism activities and spaces for private and corporate events.
The vineyards are planted on different types of soil, including clay, clay and limestone marls and sandy soils with varying degrees of clay.
The characteristics of the soils in the regions where the wineries are located give rise to distinctive wines, with balance and aromatic sophistication in the interior and lightness and vigour in the coastal areas.
The brands are presented on the market with the "Quatro Cravos" label as a commitment to guarantee quality and to assume the company's institutional responsibility with its products.
HISTORY
Martinho da Silva Cravo, founder of Adega do Cravo
It was 1722 when Father Manuel Pinto de Aguiar, a native of Vila Boa de Quires in Marco de Canavezes, took over as curate of the church of São Bartolomeu do Troviscal. The priest was Sebastiana Pinto da Mota's maternal uncle and his niece came to live with him in Troviscal, marrying Manuel da Fonseca Carvalho, from Póvoa do Carreiro, on 31 August 1732. The uncle-cure was well connected at the time and supported the young couple, with Manuel da Fonseca Carvalho being promoted to ensign in 1741 and catapulted to Captain of Ordnance in 1755. In the region's society, this was a position of the utmost social importance and gave the family a top position on the social ladder and economic relief.
The couple's last son, José da Mota Carvalho, married Bárbara Joaquina dos Santos in 1770 and it was into this original branch that the Cravo family would fit, with the marriage in 1906 of Martinho da Silva Cravo to Maria Rosa Domingues Martins, daughter of Sebastião da Mota Domingues Gala, a farmer with extensive experience in the art of winemaking and a cellar with two dozen barrels of wine.
In 1911 the first winery of the Cravo branch was built, the "Adega Cravo", with a capacity of four mills and equipped with the most modern equipment at the time. The barrels of wine left the winery in ox carts that travelled along the road to the Boco river, where they were unloaded onto moliceiros boats until they reached their destination, located in the riverside regions of Furadouro and Ovar. The success of the business and the plentiful money led the founder, Martinho Cravo, to a careless lifestyle and sloppy care of the vineyards, which eventually jeopardised his economic possibilities and led to the slow decline of the farmhouse and winery.
DEVELOPMENT
The merger with PositiveWine and the construction of the Original Winery enabled Sociedade Quatro Cravos to take on its definitive form, with activities extending to the wine-growing area, wine tourism and the provision of spaces for events.
Businessman Alberto Cravo
Despite the difficulties, the winery remained in the family for two more generations until great-grandson Alberto Cravo formed "Sociedade Agrícola Quatro Cravos, Lda" in 2014 to modernise the business and scale up to a new entrepreneurial dimension.
In order to gain technical capacity and a higher level of quality in its wines, in 2015 the company joined Positivewine as a shareholder, with oenology being entrusted to the expertise of oenologist Nuno Bastos.
In 2016, the "Adega Original" was built due to the inability to grow on the premises of the old "Adega Cravo". To complement the production of the old vines, clay-limestone land was acquired to plant new vines and gain size and consistency in the production of high-quality still and sparkling wines.
At the end of 2021, the two companies will merge and PositiveWine will be integrated into the assets of "Sociedade Agrícola Quatro Cravos".
ACTUALITY
Executive Comitee: Aniceto Santos, Nuno Santos, Alberto Cravo, Manuel Coelho
The company's first concern was to maintain the ancestral legacy of the Cravo family in working the vineyards and to intervene in a minimalist way in the production phase. It was decided to only produce the traditional Bairrada grape varieties.
Anchored in this ancestral knowledge, the company has based its performance on the quality and dedication of its human resources, on the right product profile, on the careful choice of markets, respecting the environment and on the clear definition of strategic and operational processes.
Sociedade Agrícola Quatro Cravos, Lda." is committed to bringing together modern professional management and the traditional winemaking values of the Cravo family to produce authentic wines under the brands "Pé de Ganso", "Encosta da Dona", "Original", "Tapada de Baixo", "Flutt" and "Vivo" from grapes harvested from vineyards located in Bairrada, in the villages of São Lourenço do Bairro, Ancas, Amoreira da Gândara and Troviscal.
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