PHILIPPE
GUÉRIN

General manager and 3rd generation winemaker

A journey, a vision

Belonging to the Guérin family means choosing to prioritize the common goal beyond personalities. This family is like the Pineau it manufactures: it has fully integrated that it is the assembly of particularities that creates balance, strength and originality.

Philippe Guérin uses these powerful ties to ensure the stability, the confidence he needs to look everywhere, elsewhere, around him, far towards the sky, or there, towards the ocean that borders his vineyards.

If he still looks behind him, it is to rediscover the thousand and one riches that constitute this heritage that he assumes, with integrity, that he distills in the still of the experience to collect the true riches.

This treasure, it is in the crucible of innovation that he sublimates it, to transform the Pineau according to the Guérin philosophy: to weave heritage and modernity, to anchor innovation in know-how.

Philippe Guérin is more like a chess player than a mad scientist. When he embarks on an adventure, he does so with a clearly identified goal.

The discoveries made during his studies, the experiments tried in Bordeaux (such as the vinification of white wine in barrels) nourish his first attempts. In 1994, he tried the maceration of Montils.

In 2012, after some hesitation, he started fermentations. From this step into the unknown, the "Rose" was born, atypical, unique. However, we must not see in this essay the stroke of genius of an artist, who would have got up one fine morning with a "why not" in mind. Philippe Guérin is more like a chess player than a m »ad scientist. When he embarks on the adventure of Rose, he does so with, in mind, a clearly identified objective.

Philippe knows it: the Pineau suffers from a corny and old-fashioned image. To dust off the product, it must be placed on the field of trends. He created the Rose specifically for cocktails. He wants product that is standardized enough and easy to identify. Pearl and Ruby quickly complete the range. Philippe has chosen to bring in barrels of different woods, to create, for each product, the typicity that is unique and specific to him.

Philippe composes his Pineaux in the manner of an impressionist painter

With ageusia from a few months old to 20 years old, he has retained a sense of wonder at the multitude and complexity of the world of flavors. Even if he admits to an adventurous side regarding taste, being fond of unexpected and "twisty" flavors, he likes nothing more than achieving the perfect blend of roundness and fullness, the balance of sugar, acidity and alcohol. He leads his Pineau towards gustatory perfection, as much as towards intellectual harmony.

Taking the time to become a spectator, observer, admirer, to better understand, protect, express the beauty of the wild but sublimated by this "piece of the world" for which we are responsible, so as to become its smuggler.

The days when we planted vines where nothing else grew are over

It is now a question of appropriating the environment to get the best out of it. The sublimation of the fruits of the vine passes through the preliminary expression of the terroir through the work of the winegrower. It falls to the latter the responsibility to soak up the environment of which he is the craftsman, to perfect the synergy that exists between nature and the winegrower.

Societal expectations, exacerbated by repeated health crises, global warming, the difficulty in dealing with the transmission of diseases ... there is no shortage of reasons that push winegrowers to introspection and questioning. The current vineyard, efficient but fragile, requires returning to the rational, to the solid, to think of a different management of the vines, to reconstitute an environment that balances itself.

Thinking about the vineyard differently

For Philippe, it is also accepting that he fits into a larger ecosystem than just growing vines. It means agreeing to devote 10% of the land to the diversity of species, to create a balance beneficial to plants, animals and people. It is (re)planting trees, hedges, choosing to see them not as mechanical constraints, but as so many natural assets for the sustainability of the terroir, the working tool, the land to be transmitted.

Once again, this boils down to coming back to an ancestral common sens, taking the time to become a spectator, observer, admirer, to better understand, protect, express the beauty of the wild but sublimated by this "piece of the world" for which we are responsible, so as to become its smuggler.

The first steps

Philippe Guérin is one of the "last little ones" of the third generation "Guérin Family", the one who has seen the Puy Gaudin company multiply production and sales tenfold, moving from direct and local to large retail circuits.
Growing up in a family of passionate winegrowers roots and develops in him his love of nature, the vines, the products they offer to those who know how to listen to them and reveal them. He relies on the confidence generated by the comfort of evolving in a familiar world and mastered since always to develop his natural curiosity.

The family and subsidiary transmission guarantees knowledge of viticultural practices. Aware of the need to create a link between production and sales force, he turned to a technical-commercial BTS of wines and spirits. This training allows him to integrate these notions. He implements them in Puy Gaudin, and uses them to bring the products in line with the expectations of consumers. Far from stopping at the family business, Philippe also harbors this ambition for the local "Interprofession".

He settled in 1993, on the 7 hectares of vines transmitted by his father and 3 hectares purchased in his own name. He works a little in Puy Gaudin, whose functioning is still partly based on family members.

The end of the 90s saw the last members of the 2nd generation leave the company for good. The development of volumes is for Philippe an opportunity to listen to his desire to renew winemaking techniques, to open them to other modes discovered during his BTS.

In 2000, he joined the Pineau Union, while developing his role within Puy Gaudin

His unfailing curiosity and his spirit of initiative naturally designate him to take charge of the development of the company's quality system. The preparation for ISO certification makes it possible to structure the company and facilitates the implementation of the production development and marketing projects that the company undertakes, at the same time. As quality manager, Philippe is involved in the nascent project of design and construction of the new building. With the increase in the production tool, the company sees the number of employees increase from 3 to 15.

Philippe agrees to take on the role of director of Puy Gaudin. If he becomes the guarantor of the economic development and the stability of the company, it is also his responsibility to ensure this development in the spirit that has animated the family for three generations. If the economic and financial viability of Puy Gaudin is the necessary condition for its sustainability, it is unthinkable and unthinkable for this family that this would harm the expression of the passion that flows in their veins.

ALCOHOL ABUSE IS DANGEROUS FOR YOUR HEALTH, CONSUME IN MODERATION.

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PHILIPPE GUÉRIN