Tenute Rubino > Who we are > Tenute Rubino: company profile

Believing in the territory.
Quality, entrepreneurial management and culture of the territory. An additional value for Salento: The new frontier of the Italian oenological excellence.

In the mid 80s the Rubino family founded the winery through the acquisition of a number of estates that, within a decade, formed Tenute Rubino, an important productive reality, which today is fully active, counting more than 500 hectares in production, 200 of which are devoted to viticulture of excellence. It was the beginning of a productive course that, in 2000 resulted in the construction of a new vinification and refining cellar, located in Brindisi, and in the realization of an entrepreneurial project, based on quality-wine production in a territory – that of Northern Salento – which is particularly suitable  for wine-growing.

Architect of this new challenge of production and marketing maturity is the young entrepreneur of Brindisi, Luigi Rubino, who, in the enhancement of the territory and of the indigenous species of vine of Apulian tradition, recognizes the key for the 'oenological renaissance of the region' that could not be postponed any longer. Years of painstaking work and strong commitment but also of great appreciation began, allowing this young company to gain experience and productive awareness, enabling it to deal with new and  more distant markets, as well as with more and more demanding quality-wine consumers.

Today Tenute Rubino deals with 20 foreign markets which cover 70% of the sales, a data that proves evidence of the company’s ability of facing the international dimension of the markets that is continually in search of quality-wines through the restaurant distribution channel. [] Tenute Rubino has kept releasing, one vintage after the other, wines of great interest and character, expression of the family’s dedication to enhance the value of native varieties and utilize those viticulture-practices that concentrate on the peculiarity of each varietal: Primitivo, Negroamaro, White and Black Malvasia, and, most of all, Susumaniello, a unique and rare species of vine (faced with the danger of extinction) on which Tenute Rubino has launched a strategic productive and valorisation project.

The productive context in Apulia
Accelerate innovation processes in order to affirm competitive quality.

Apulia is the future of the Italian oenology. This is what winemakers, economists and researches said about the made-in-Italy wine five years ago. A new Eldorado was announced, after the Sicilian one, for the Italian-quality wine that, focusing its attention on Apulia and Salento, recognized the new frontiers of the Italian oenology of excellence. Lead brands of long-tradition wine-growing regions seized the opportunity of investing in this area of great productive potentials, [] having the ideal soil and climatic conditions to produce unique and inimitable wines. Only a few wine-companies have actually trusted this opportunity and moved consequently.

The scenario isn’t homogenous yet, not everyone has made the right investments in order to break-up with the recent past of the Apulian wine and the idea of Apulia as a large volume grape-producer region, as it has been considered for decades. This idea does not absolutely belong to the Rubino family and to Tenute Rubino, always committed to the fulfilment of that entrepreneurial and productive project, from the beginning aimed at focusing their attention on quality-driven wines and confronting themselves with the best productions in Italy.

Tenute Rubino winery
Constant research for extreme quality and enhancement of native grape varieties, aimed at the creation of wines of territory that express the intense features of the Mediterranean vineyards.

In the mid 80s Tommaso Rubino started acquiring estates in the Salento territory, creating the basis for the future development. In the 90s, inspite of a period of deep crisis for the sector, further investments to implant new vineyards were carried out. This was an unconventional choice, which was rewarded by excellent results achieved in a very short time. A path towards the research for extreme quality and for enhancement of the native grape varieties, aimed at the creation of wines of territories that express the intense characteristics of the Mediterranean vineyards.  Today Tommaso’s son, Luigi Rubino, runs with great passion and clear awareness of the business potentiality a leader company in Apulia, which is destined to encrease the production flows within a few years. The young entrepreneur, who is a prominent figure in the Apulian wine-producing panorama, has chosen to devote himself to the realization of his dream of quality-wine production.

'I’ve been working in the winery since 1992 but I have always been involved by my father in all the activities concerning the production of vegetables, olives and grain as well as in the works of valorisation of traditional cultivations and modernisation of cultivation-technologies and procedures. Soon after achieving my diploma, he says enthusiastically, I immediately started accumulating knowledge and fundamental experiences – to do the best in this field – by working and studying at university at the same time .'

His was a brilliant career: Luigi Rubino achieved his MBA degree in only four years and immediately after dedicated himself completely to the growth of the company through strategic investments in the vineyards as well as in modern cellar equipment. Step by step, the company developed, sharpened the production processes and began a strategic plan of distribution and commercialization with a particular focus on the foreign market.

'After years of experience in grape commercialization – adds Luigi Rubino – we decided to complete the production chain through the construction of the cellar, whose construction started in 1999 and continued until 2005, with work of enlargement and of rationalization of the structures. Today our wines are known and appreciated all over the world; they definitely are ambassadors for Salento, they are expression of the land in which they are generated. We strongly believe in the potentials of this territory, in its native grape varieties, its rich soil, its sea and its long-tradition wine culture. Today Tenute Rubino brand is a dynamic, modern and determined reality aimed at carrying out the project we have always had in mind despite of all obstacles.'