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Tonnellerie Rousseau Coopers from father to son Tonnellerie Rousseau (Rousseau Cooperage) is the only company in Burgundy that produces both vats and barrels. Since 2015, the company has moved its production facilities for large-format barrels to Gevrey-Chambertin, in a new workshop measuring 1800 square metres. The savoir-faire developed over three generations now allows Tonnellerie Rousseau to export 65% of its production. The company has been a family affair from the outset, a fact it wears proudly on its sleeve. Tonnellerie Rousseau Père & Fils was created in 1954 by my father, Julien, Jean-Marie Rousseau, the general manager of the company since 1990, tells us. His wife Nicole joined him in 1991. Today she is the chief financial officer (CFO). By their sides are two of their children, Frédéric and Jean-Christophe, commercial director and manager of the production site in Gevrey-Chambertin respectively. While the Tonnellerie Rousseau employs about forty people today, for a long time it stayed a very small operation. When Julien Rousseau created the company after training as a cooper in Dijon, the business was focused on the restoration of large-volume wine barrels tuns and vats mostly bought from wine merchants and dealers in Germany or Paris-Bercy. There wasn t much man power involved ( two or three people, no more ). Jean-Marie, for his part, was still in short pants when he took his first trip in the truck with his father, to Bercy. The memories come flooding back when he thinks back to that time when anything was possible. At 14, he was invited to La Tour d Argent in Paris with his father and Mr Védrenne, a cassis producer, travelling to the capital to choose used equipment. At 18 this is at the end of the 1960s Jean-Marie left school to learn the coopering trade from his father, when France was paralysed by endless strikes. At that time, cooperage was dying, he says. There wasn t anywhere you could order new casks or barrels. There was only recycling. That helped us a lot because at that time people only wanted to use the plastic or stainless steel containers that had replaced wood, Jean-Marie remembers. He worked all over France, on all types of containers (vats, tuns and fûts the standard 228-litre Burgundy barrels), for storing and aging all kinds of consumable liquid (wines, spirits, oil, vinegar, cider...). From Orléans to Nantes, Carvin to Vitrolle, he put them together and took them apart, hitting the road and burning up the kilometres.
The company makes 12,000 standard barrels per year, plus almost 200 tuns. In the 60s and 70s, there were still forty artisanal-style cooperages in Burgundy, which, like the one founded by Julien Rousseau, employed only one or two people. Today, they are thinner on the ground. The region numbers about twenty coopers, all of whom only make new barrels now. There are no longer any that can perform the restoration work that for a long time was the core business of the Rousseau company. The export boom It was the Americans who led the revival of the new barrel market, when they started developing their wine-growing regions, says Jean-Marie. First they came to Burgundy to look for grape varieties (Chardonnay and Pinot Noir). Then they became interested in how wines were aged in Burgundy. For vat and barrel manufacturers, this new market was a windfall, and Julien and Jean-Marie Rousseau could not reasonably pass it up. In 1985, the small business took the plunge, making its first new barrels. It made 200 in that first year. Thirty years later, in 2016, it manufactures 12,000 barrels per year, plus almost 200 vats. Rousseau, who supplies prestigious estates, including those of Francis Ford Coppola. Tonnellerie Rousseau now generates 65% of its turnover in exports to 32 destinations in the United States, Spain, Italy, Luxembourg... In each country it exports to, Tonnellerie Rousseau relies on sales agents or distributors, who act as its representatives. Seeking to diversify, the cooperage worked for the first time this year with some French and foreign breweries. In 2015, the company will have generated its highest turnover since its creation. Since Frédéric Rousseau, after graduating from the École Supérieure de Gestion de Paris (the Paris Business School), came back to the company in 2004, Tonnellerie Rousseau has developed a slightly more proactive strategy. Frédéric has formed a small team in which he looks after English-speaking countries alongside two other sales representatives, one dedicated to German-speaking countries and one to Spanish-speaking countries. Since the 1st March 2016, a new person has joined the division, to revitalise the local market in Burgundy, where the company still generates 20% of its turnover. In 1985, the Rousseau cooperage concentrated first on nearby markets, in Burgundy, and tested a few international markets that seemed promising. It was an order from a United States winery in 1995 that allowed it to take its first step across the Atlantic. Ten barrels in the first year, twenty in the second, sixty in the third. Today, that estate is still one the company s best clients, ordering 800 to 900 barrels per year... Coopering requires a climate of trust, which takes time, stresses Jean-Marie Striving for excellence To consolidate its growth, Tonnellerie Rousseau will continue to invest. More than 2 million euros have already been committed in 2015 so that the company, currently based in Couchey, has a new production site in Gevrey- Chambertin. This is will be the production site for the vats and tuns which is to say barrels holding more than
Coopering requires a climate of trust, which takes time. 600 litres. But the goal is to base all of the company s activities there over the next four years: apart from barrel making there will be the storage, which at the moment is 40 kilometres from the production site. When ordering, clients can choose oak from central France (from the famous Tronçais forest in particular) or north-eastern France (from Vosges, north of Burgundy). The choice depends on the desired flavour profile. The sweetness of the oak harvested in central France and the vanilla notes that develop in it are particularly suited, apart from wines, to the great cognacs. At the opposite end of the spectrum, the oaks from eastern France are low in polysaccharides and aromatic compounds, while being rich in polyphenols. They are therefore particularly suited to red wines. The toasting process ultimately neutralises the aggressive qualities of the wood and, beyond that, brings out its most interesting flavours. It can be treated with a lightly, medium or heavy toasting: here again, the customer gives the instructions, depending on the desired characteristics. Tonnellerie Rousseau, which sells its range under different names (Piano, Allegro, Forte, Video), pioneered this notion of flavour profile in the late 1990s. Cooperage has its fashions too, says Jean-Marie. When Parker ruled supreme, the barrels were called on to deliver the maximum amount of woodiness, so prized by the US wine critic. Today, the pendulum has swung the other way, to the point where the large-format containers have taken off because only a small surface area is in contact with the wine in relation to the stored volume. The success of the company is based on a savoir-faire that goes beyond woodwork. The selection of the staves, the raising of the barrel (its mise en rose), the shaping, the toasting process monitored to the millimetre, then finishing and checking the seal: the coopers have developed skills that are both varied and sophisticated, in which the company encourages excellence. In 2004, it encouraged its employees to enter the competition for the title of Meilleur Ouvrier de France (MOF Best Artisan in France). Five of them obtained the title, including Jean- Marie s father Julien and his brother Guy (deceased in 2014). In 2007, five more were awarded the title of MOF, including Jean-Marie and his son Jean-Christophe. In 2015, a new employee received the famous distinction, thus bringing the number of MOF trained by Tonnellerie Rousseau to 11, including 3 generations of the Rousseau family. In 2004, the company encouraged its employees to enter the competition for the title of Meilleur Ouvrier de France. Five of them received the title. In 2007, five more were awarded the title of MOF. Turnover: 10,5 millions Workforce: 35 employees
TONNELLERIE ROUSSEAU ZA des Champys 21160 Couchey Tél : +33 (0)3 80 52 30 28 www.tonnellerie-rousseau.com/ Éditions du Signe - 1 rue Alfred Kastler - BP 10094 Eckbolsheim - 67038 STRASBOURG CEDEX Tél : +33 (0) 3 88 78 91 91 - Fax : +33 (0) 3 88 78 91 99 - www.editionsdusigne.fr - email : info@editionsdusigne.fr Tiré à part de l ouvrage «L Excellence en Côte d Or - Le savoir-faire des entreprises».