Corporate Profile
Do your wines embody the producer’s passion or terroir characteristics?
- We stand by our “100% reefer principle” for all of our products in order to deliver the producer’s
passion and terroir characteristics.
“100% reefer” refers to the transportation of our imported wines in refrigerated shipping containers, also known as “reefer” containers, which keep the wines at a constant temperature throughout the entire journey across oceans and over land, from the producers to customers.
Flavor of wine is affected by environment. When shipped and stored at appropriate temperatures, wine will retain its genuine taste. However, when wine is in an improper environment, its flavor would change.
As a wine importer, we thought about ways to deliver these “Blessings of Nature” and “Passions of the Producer” the way they are, resulting in the introduction of our “100% reefer” principle.
The word “reefer” is not native to the wine industry. For instance, one can refer to a product as “reefer” only if a reefer container is used during the maritime shipping
process. We choose the “100% reefer” wording because a constant temperature is maintained the throughout our entire shipping process; at sea and even on land.
This is a reefer truck. They collect wines from each producer and then transport to the forwarder’s warehouses.
Wines gathered at the forwarder’s warehouses will be packed in containers and transported to the port. Electric power is always on, even in the container yard. The temperature is always under strict control regardless of time and point.
Reefer containers, constructed using aluminium. copper, and stainless, are frigeration units, with insulation materials in the walls. For sea transportation, reefer containers are surrounded by “dry” containers or placed under the ships deck so that they are not exposed to direct sunlight.
| direct shipment transportation courses and durations to Japan | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| France | 31days | America | 12days |
| Italy | 30days | Argentina | 25days |
| Spain | 37days | Australia | 14days |
| Germany | 35days | South-Africa | 24days |
All wines are stored at Teisan Warehouse at Yokohama Daikoku pier where a constant temperature inside the reefer container is constantly maintained.
Ships port at either Tokyo or Yokohama. Electric power remains on while the container is delivered from the ship to Teisan Warehouse, which usually takes at least 15 minutes. The photo below is where the container is placed. The container receives electricity via the red plug in the middle of the generator.
After arriving at Teisan Warehouse, electric cables are reconnected to the red plugs on the containers so that wine’s temperature is maintained.
Teisan Warehouse’s dock shelters are resizable for any containers or trucks. Therefore, wines will not be exposed to air during unloading.
Quality control, labelling, and sorting of the shipped wine are all done inside this climate-controlled warehouse.
The most difficult part of instituting our “100% reefer” principle was the transition from existing land transportation methods in South America or South Africa to our preferred reefer transport.
In France or Italy where logistics are well developed, reefer transportation has been widely adopted. However, in countries like Argentina where dry transportation is the most common method we had to arrange for reefer trucks to transport our wines.
Currently, we have succeeded in implementing reefer transportation in 11 countries including Chile, Argentina and South Africa.
It was achieved by understanding in our partner companies, including production, transportation, and storage. Thank you for those fine people for understanding our philosophy that: Wine brings the “Blessings of Nature” and “Passions of the Producer”, a joy which we seek to share and spread.
Also, cost reduction is achieved by using more 40 ft. containers instead of 20 ft. containers, importation more efficient. Therefore, we put “100% reefer” into practice without increasing the price of our products for consumers.
Wines shipped by 100% reefer have labels on the back of the bottles saying “100% reefer principle”. (New labels are used for imports since July 2009. Some wines do not have these labels because some producers use their own labels.)
Check out our labels on the back of our imported wine at your local stores.
We are planning eco-friendly practices beyond saving energy through implementing more efficient port entry. These practices will be updated on our website.
*1: JF Hillebrand Japan Co., Ltd.
*2: Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd.
*3: Sanjo Transportation KK(not available English site)
*4: Teisan Warehouse Co., Ltd.