Javier Bitar, the new CEO of Santa Rita Estates, tells Louis Thomas how he plans to reassess the South American wine giant's "two souls".
Speaking with
the drinks business at ProWein last week, Bitar, who joined Santa Rita Estates in August 2024, said: “First, you have to know where you’re starting from. Santa Rita is a fantastic company which has been around for many years, it has been a pioneer in several things – for example, Casa Real was one of the first icon wines from Chile, and it had something very unique at that point, which was that it only exported Reserva-or-older wines. So when Chilean wine was in the trenches, Santa Rita was one of the only ones to say they wanted to play in the big leagues. It has always been a market leader, so when I was invited to join, I thought ‘how could I not?’.”
Although Bitar, formerly of Viña San Pedro, has a wealth of experience in the wine sector, he shared that something has stood out in particular about Santa Rita: "Since I joined, one thing which has surprised me is the quality of the wines. I remember the first meeting I had with the winemaking team and we started tasting, I was surprised, not because I didn’t think they would be good, but because they were really outstanding wines."
Prioritising premium
However, he expressed a belief that there is room for improvement with regards to the company's strategy.
"I think Santa Rita has lost a step or two in the last few years, in terms of growth and not being consumer-oriented and attuned to what is going on in the markets, and also at some point in the history, there was an opening to grow in terms of volume, and so we joined the entry level wine fight," he explained. "That, in my experience working in that side of the wine business, is more retail-oriented – volume, price, low margins, and it sucks energy, it is very demanding, you have to be very wary of each cent! It’s a very different world to the on-trade, independent, specialised store side, which is where Santa Rita was the leader. We had two souls, and that contributed to a loss of focus on the premium side."
"The ambition is to become a leading premium winery again and to gain more recognition worldwide. We’re facing a world with wine consumption going down, the younger generation is moving towards RTDs and spirits, and we need to bring them back by being attuned to how they experience wine. We have to be innovative," noted Bitar. "I left the wine industry 12 years ago – looking today, what is particularly surprising is the amount of innovation in the last few years, and we need to get on board with that and play in that field."
What hasn't necessarily been a phenomenon of the last few years is premiumisation, according to Bitar: "I think since 2008/9, we started seeing a move towards premium in many countries, and not only in wine – in spirits and beer too. Luxury also became a larger world. Even after Covid, you can see that the higher end is the more resilient part of the wine industry. The lower end is dropping off, and ultra-premium wines are holding their ground or even growing slightly. And also what we call ‘premium’ in Chile is not considered as such in many parts of the world – we grew from the bottom up, and there is a lot of volume."
Target markets
"Sometimes you try to do something for everybody and it’s difficult to do! So we’ve decided to focus on eight to 10 markets. There's Brazil, which is huge for Chile, and Ireland for us in particular – we are the bestselling wine brand in Ireland by far, we have 46% of the export share of Chilean wine to Ireland."
Ireland,
rather like Chile itself, has attracted the ire of the wine sector for its
plans to introduce health warnings on the back labels of bottles of alcohol from next year, but Bitar pointed out that there is only so much producers can actually do about this: "We have to do whatever the governments decide. I don’t like it, I would prefer those labels weren’t there, but we have to do it – the World Health Organisation is pushing against alcohol in general."
"Then there's the US, as long as we are not subject to tariffs – we have to be quiet," he continued. "But it’s a very tough market to crack, it’s not one country, it’s 50 states, and each has its own laws and culture. The US has very high barriers to entry, but once you’re in, it is usually a very good market. And then there’s Asia – China, South Korea and Japan are still very good markets for Chile, and we have a lot more to gain in those markets."
As for the UK market, Bitar described it as something of a "headache" due to how competitive it is: "We’ve never been able to be hugely successful there, so we want to give it another go."
Innovation and expansion
As for Santa Rita Estates' plans within Chile itself, where its Santa Rita and Carmen brands are based, Bitar noted that the latter's spirit of "innovation" will be continued under his leadership, with unusual wines, such as field blends or those made using unconventional winemaking techniques.
The company also has its eyes on the potential of some of Chile's more southerly zones.
“We’re making an experimental traditional method, 100% Pinot Noir sparkling wine on the island of Chiloé – the first from that region, but a very small production, only 57 bottles," he said. "We’re also doing some work with the university in Osorno, which is in the south – planting vineyards.”
Chiloé, alongside Rapa Nui/Easter Island, was made a new Chilean Denominación de Origen (DO) last year.
Santa Rita Estates' Chiloé vineyard was actually planted by its chairman, Baltazar Sánchez, whose name adorns the label of the extremely limited production of Carmen DO Punta Chilen Espumante de la Isla de Chiloé (just 38 bottles were produced last year).
"We also planted a large vineyard in Cauquenes, which is further south than where viticulture was traditional, and we have some wines from Itata in the DO range – we’re experimenting," Bitar stated.
Of course, one of the big draws of these cooler zones is that they provide mitigation against warmer growing seasons.
"Climate change is apparent every year," as Bitar put it.
The 2025 harvest
Unfortunately for producers from the Southern Hemisphere, trade show season often arrives smack bang in the middle of picking, and for Santa Rita Estates last week was no exception.
Offering a preliminary report on how the fruit is looking, Bitar said: “Thankfully it was a very wet winter – after many, many years when it was very dry, this almost made up for it. We had an okay spring, but a hot summer, so the harvest was brought forward by a couple of weeks. What we’ve seen is that the whites are coming in a little bit lighter than what was originally expected, and the reds have just started, but we feel that it will be a similar-sized harvest to last year, and at veraison the winemakers were very optimistic about the high-end reds, but this was a month ago, so I need to get back and check!”
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