Henkell Freixenet has bought out its distribution joint-venture partner in Portugal.
The sparkling wine group, which has its headquarters in Wiesbaden in Germany, has spent an undisclosed sum on bringing the Vinicom division in-house. The company made the move to capitalise on Portugal’s position as “one of the fastest growing sparkling wine markets in Europe”.
Vinicom commenced operations in 2004 under the control of Francisco de Sousa Coutinho. Henkell Feixenet held a 49.5% stake in the distributor, which handles the group’s sparkling and still wine portfolio as several domestic third-party brands.
“We see a great momentum and future opportunities for our brands and partners, such as Freixenet and Mionetto, together with the outstanding portfolio of Portuguese wine brands to further develop this dynamic market,” said CEO Andreas Brokemper.
In April, Henkell Freixenet, which is privately-owned, booked a lift in reported sales of just over 4% with the ‘Western Europe’ reporting region delivering a 2.5% sales increase.
