On November 27, 28 and 29, 2008 the Second International Malbec Days will take place in Lujan de Cuyo, Argentina. As you certainly remember, Argentina was the guest of honor of our First International Days in Cahors. Argentina returns the invitation.

Cahors professional and political leaders will be the guests of the "Municipalidad" of Lujan de Cuyo:

- Alain JANICOT, President of the UIVC (Professional Union of Cahors Vintners)
- Executives : Jérémy ARNAUD, Marketing Director and Mylène DOUX, enologist
- Merchants : Olivier PIERON (RVSO), Pierre GOUTTENOIRE (Maison RIGAL), Didier PELVILLAIN (PELVILLAIN), Jacques TRANIER (VINOVALIES, including the Côtes d'Olt), Bertrand VIGOUROUX (VIGOUROUX Group)
- Producers : Pascal VERHAEGHE (Château du CEDRE), Philippe LEJEUNE (Château CHAMBERT), Martial GUIETTE and his wife (Château les ROQUES DE CANA)
- Special Guests : Gilles MARRE (President of the BONNES TABLES DU LOT, Hervé ROMAT (enologist, President of CDV)
- Journalists: Laurent BENAYOUN and Bernard BURTSCHY
- Local politicians: Jean-Marc VAYSSOUZE (Mayor of Cahors), Bernard CHOULET (Vice-President of General Council of the department, in charge of Agriculture).

Here is the program (subject to changes):

From 6:00 to 10:00pm everyday: professional tastings of Cahors and Lujan de Cuyo wines; VIP dinners and cooking contests under the supervision of a French chef from the Cahors area.

- November 27: professional meetings between French and Argentinian companies ; bodegas visits.

- November 28: meetings between French and Argentinian scientists to discuss "terroirs" and varietals.

- November 29: discussions and brainstormings on how to protect and give more value to the malbec varietal; common marketing strategies. Bodegas' visits.

- November 30: after so much work, a little break with a folk event.

Stay tuned! We'll keep you posted as we complete our program.

This weekend, starting Friday evening, Cahors was the world capital of Malbec. Wine makers, producers, marketers and experts gathered in Cahors for 3 days of exchanges, talks, tastings and fun.

Inaugural celebration

Friday night, Cahors officials welcomed their guests in the beautiful Cahors "lounge" - a space decorated as a lounge wine bar near the gorgeous Valentré bridge whose 700th anniversary happens to be this same year. Along the walls of the big room, several of the best Cahors, Touraine and Argentina producers offered their wines for tasting. Their wines graced the food catered by the best chefs of the region: cappuccino of mushrooms, lamb, duck, foie gras were among the delicacies offered as well as great chocolate and meringue desserts - whose flavors exploded against the spiciness of Malbec. Orchestras and DJs entertained the happy crowd until late in the evening.

International conference

Saturday morning, everybody was back to work at 8:30 am for the international conference on "Malbec, grape of the 21st century", as Robert Parker named it. Several speakers shared the podium: Nicolas Vivas made a very clear presentation of the chemical components of the Malbec grape. During the panel discussion that followed his speech, journalists, wine makers and experts from France and Argentina commented on the quality of the Malbec grape, its development in the world, how to market it and its image. Cristina Pandolfi gave us - in an impressive French - a great overview of the wine industry and the place of Malbec in this industry in Argentina. She was followed by Yohann Castaing, wine consultant in Bordeaux, who dug on the Internet all the mentions of words on Malbec. His analysis based on data mining showed that:

- the Malbec grape is easy to market, tasted as frutiy and spicy, answers the tastes of the younger consumers and is trendy, is considered a qualitative grape.

- the image of the producing ares are good: the image of Argentine is based on a good QPR, on trends and business but is still a little blurred in the consumer's mind; the image of Cahors rests on the "black wine" tradition, its famous terroir and its high quality.

- the consumer has difficulty differentiating Malbec, Cahors and Argentina; the Malbec has a good image by itself and not so much in relation to its producing region.

The recommendations of Yohann Castaing to market successfully the Malbec are to:

- associate the Malbec's image to tradition and modernism and
- differentiate Argentina and Cahors Malbecs through the true values of each region.

His presentation was followed by the one of the consulting firm Eranos from Paris on the imaginary dimension of the Malbec grape. The speaker valued the symbolic color of the Malbec, the black. Black is the color of unity, since it's the sum of the primary colors. It unifies Argentina, country of purity and Cahors, city of the world.

Tasting on the Valentré Bridge

After the conference, listeners, speakers and officials gathered on the bridge to taste the wines of over 100 producers from Cahors, Touraine, Argentina and eat the food cooked again by the best chefs of the Lot area. We'll put on line in the next few days the complete list of producers and wines selected for the event.

The Friendship Pact between City of Cahors and the Province of Lujan in Argentina

After an evening spent discovering wines and food from France and Argentina, officials and journalists gathered at the Town Hall to sign the Friendship Pact between the City of Cahors and the Province of Lujan. The eventful but tiring day ended by an offical dinner in one of the best restaurants of Cahors.

On Sunday, the "fiesta" continued. The bridge was open to everybody who could taste wine and food for free all day.

Today is THE day. Everybody interested in Malbec is coming to Cahors. There are 800 people who will attend the VIP evening in the lounge wine bar of Espace Valentré. Several dozens of wine makers will present their wine on the Valentré Bridge. Argentinian officials and wine makers wil also be present. 

We'll tell you everything next week when the french-malbec.com team will be back. Stay tuned!

Celebrations around our favorite grape, Malbec, start as early as April 3rd with the very exclusive VIP dinner at the Château de Grézels: French and Argentinian officials and wine producers will meet to talk about business.

On April 4th, from 11:00am to 2:00pm, the city of Cahors will welcome enology students from all over France: those lucky people will be part of a private tasting of the Cahors wines on the famous Valentré bridge. In the evening, wine professionals will gather around wine and food pairing in the Espace Valentré.

There are a few extra events on the agenda of April 5th: in the early evening, in the Town Hall of Cahors, the mayor, Jean-Marc Vayssoure-Faure, the Regional President of the Lot department, Gérard Miquel and the Intendent of the Depratment of Lujan de Cuyo will sign the "Friendship Pact" between Cahors, Lujan and the Lot. Other officials will be present: Paul Burlot, honorary Consul of France in Argentina, M. Benitz, Production Minister in the Province of San Juan, José Eduardo Molina, president of the Coviar, Carlo Basso, representing the Lujan wine cellars and Jean-Marie Sigaud, president of the professional syndicate of Cahors. This event will be followed by private dinners, at La Chantrerie for journalists and wine makers and at Mercues for the French and Argentinian officials.

The countdown starts today. It's not a joke for Fool's April Day!

Read the program of our convention on Saturday morning and register for the 3 days!