About Cramele Recas

Founded in 1998 by Bristol-born Philip Cox and his wife Elvira, Cramele Recas is currently Romania’s largest exporter of wine and the biggest seller of premium wine in the country.

Replanting on ancient vines dating back to the 14^th century, Cramele Recas now covers over 1,200 hectares of state-of-the-art vineyard located in the Banat region of Western Romania, where the climate is warm and continental. The planting boom that happened in 2007-2011, after Romania joined the EU, is evidenced in the quality of the grapes from vineyards, which are now entering their optimum maturity.

Recas work hard year-on-year to meet the increasing customer demand for more wine, demonstrated in the 2019 harvest with 2,735 tractor loads of grapes from their estate, plus 415 large truck loads from partner growers around the country, creating 328 tanks full of wine and around 22 million litres in total.

The range

The Cramele Recas range is global, producing 65 different wines under 247 different labels for over 25 international markets. Proud of its status as a Romanian winery, Recas is keen to promote the consumption of local varieties, including Feteasca Regala, Feteasca Neagra, Tamaioasa Romaneasca and Negru de Dragasani.

The Recas winemaking team this year is the biggest and best since the company was founded, with six winemakers overall. Besides chief winemakers, Australian Hartley Smithers and Spanish Nora Iriate, the team has expanded to include Mat O’Driscoll from New Zealand working in Recas, and Stephen Bennett and Alice Lugli from Italy, running the partner crush wineries in the East of Romania. The last team member is the veteran cellar manager – Romanian Florin Voloaca running the bottling and blending at Recas.

Key wines and suppliers

• Sanziana label – available at Corney & Barrow
• Solevari label – available at Virgin Wines
• Orange Natural Wine (Solara) – Alliance
• Wildflower – St Austells
• Dreambird – St Austells
• Calusari – Hennings Wine

Mitchells & Butler, Alliance Wines, Tanners, Adnams, St Austell and Forth Wine import to the UK on-trade.