Familia Torres

Spanning five generations and 151 years of winemaking history, Familia Torres has a firm belief in social, environmental and economic sustainability. The Spanish wine producer brings together its long-held traditions with constant innovation to maintain its world-leading reputation.

“The origins of Familia Torres are in the Penedés – the oldest wine region in Catalonia with 2,700 years of history in winemaking – located near Barcelona,” said Francesc Gómez Montenegro, chief operating officer of Familia Torres. “Every generation of the family has passed on its passion for wine culture from parents to children, a passion built on a deep respect for the Earth and tradition, as well as a belief in innovation. Today, the focus of the fifth generation is on making wines from exceptional vineyards and historical estates, as well as on recovering ancestral varieties as a way of adapting to climate change.”

The company’s Grans Muralles wine is one of the great success stories to come from Familia Torres’ commitment to recovering ancestral grape varieties. It is made from native Catalan grapes, including two ancient varieties – Garró and Querol – once believed to have been wiped out by the phylloxera plague, now restored by Familia Torres using modern viticultural techniques. Just as wine has evolved to meet changing consumer tastes over the years, so too has Familia Torres carefully adapted its business to keep pace with the times.

“The family has always preferred a slow evolution without sudden changes, remaining loyal to the vineyard and the style of wines that we like and identifies us,” Gómez said. “As a winery that exports to more than 150 countries, our approach has always been constructive and long term. While we rarely follow market trends, we do recognize that product development is key to our future success.”

The company recently implemented ENOVIA collaboration and project management applications on the 3DEXPERIENCE® platform to conduct its product development activities, including approving artwork, box layouts and label designs.

“We needed an integrated platform to handle project management, document management and the digital approval process,” Gómez explained. “We handle a large number of innovative projects in very different fields, such as our newest premium brandies: Reserva del Mamut 1985 – our most exclusive brandy produced using the Parellada grape variety and aged for over 30 years in French oak; we only produce 999 bottles – and Alta Luz, the first so-called cristalino (transparent) brandy in history made in Barcelona. The 3DEXPERIENCE platform is supporting us to bring these products to market and improve our innovation product development process.”

Before implementing the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, Familia Torres distributed information across the organization by email and physical paper documents. It meant that important information could be easily missed, and changes were difficult to track.

“Now, ENOVIA on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform always gives us up-to-date visibility of the status of a project and the assurance that we’re working with the most up-to-date version of a document, such as the latest label artwork,” Gómez said. Familia Torres worked with Dassault Systèmes partner Abgam to steer the success of its digital initiative.

“Abgam was very proactive and presented the 3DEXPERIENCE platform to us,” Gómez said. “In the end, it was simply the best option. Abgam provided training, helped us with the implementation and gives us ongoing support. We have regular meetings, a ticketing tool to manage issues and the partner is always accessible if we need it. Abgam and Dassault Systèmes have a very focused and pro-active approach towards us; you can see that they care and that they want us to get the maximum out of the 3DEXPERIENCE platform.”

The implementation phase took six months and today the 3DEXPERIENCE platform is used across the organization at Familia Torres’ main winery in Vilafranca del Penedès.

“The 3DEXPERIENCE platform helps us in our ‘Continuous Improvement’ approach, as the templates set out the specifications that determine the project tasks, ensuring full visibility and bringing agility to our approval process,” Gómez said. “The templates ensure all project team members follow all required steps. It’s a bit like booking a plane ticket, when you forget to fill something in or use the wrong format the system asks you to correct your input. In a highly complex project environment like ours, this autocorrection element really helps to keep everything aligned and on track.”

Familia Torres opted for a cloud implementation of the 3DEXPERIENCE platform as part of its wider digital strategy to move all of its software to the cloud. Today, the company is benefiting from anytime, anywhere access to the platform, and appreciating the out-of-the-box functionality and regular updates, which take into account its own specific needs.

“The improvements we’ve suggested are often incorporated into the standard cloud tool in subsequent updates,” Gómez said. “All 3DEXPERIENCE clients mutually benefit from this.”

Now, regardless of whether any of the Familia Torres team are traveling, in the office or working at home, they can all securely view documents, make comments visible to everyone and move the approval process forward.

“The information is in the same repository, it’s traceable with version control and accessible to all team members,” Gómez said. “This provides us with security, agility and autonomy that undoubtedly improves the progress of our projects. It’s a great advantage!”

With the ability for its team to manage project approvals on the go, Familia Torres has been able to significantly speed up the time it takes to launch new products.

“We are all very satisfied with the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, especially with the approval loop, which has improved the timeline enormously,” Gómez said. “The fact everyone can see the documents from wherever they are and handle approvals on their smartphone is really helpful. If we are more efficient in our project management, we can also accelerate time to market by reducing the risk of errors in the intermediate phases. We’ve halved the time it takes to approve projects.”

The 3DEXPERIENCE platform has supported the company to move to a fully digital process. This is not only saving on time and paper, but provides extra assurance that everyone is working from the most up-to-date version of a document.

“We have been able to eliminate the physical circulation of documents that needed approval, such as financial documents, production feasibility reports and product designs,” Gómez said. “All information is traceable and available to all people who are part of the approval circuit from any device, including their smartphone. It delivers efficiency and safety. For example, before we had the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, we needed to contact the project manager to obtain the latest version of a plan. But this was time-consuming for both parties. Now, we don’t lose any time.”

ENOVIA on 3DEXPERIENCE is also supporting Familia Torres to constantly improve efficiency with regular reporting and analysis.

“It records the execution times of routed tasks,” Gómez said. “This allows us to create an average approval time ranking among all directors that we share in each management committee. You can imagine the competition that exists now to improve your position in the ranking!”

Familia Torres stays true to its philosophy – The more we care for the Earth, the better our wine – as part of its ongoing commitment to protect the planet for future generations. The company has already undertaken measures to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions per bottle by 30% and aims to become Climate Positive by 2050.

“Since 2008, Familia Torres has taken active steps to combat the climate emergency, implementing adaptation and mitigation measures to reduce its carbon emissions,” Gómez said. “We have invested more than €15 million in renewable energy, biomass, electric cars, energy efficiency, adaptation of our vineyards, reforestation and research. The plan is now to achieve a reduction of 60% per bottle in 2030 and and to become Climate Positive in 2050, but to achieve this, we must work together.”

Familia Torres is a member of Primum Familiae Vini, an association representing 12 of the oldest and most prestigious wine families in the world, and is the co-founder of International Wineries for Climate Action (IWCA), which promotes the decarbonization of the wine sector.

“IWCA is a collaborative working group of environmentally committed wineries focused on a science-based approach to reducing carbon emissions across the wine industry,” Gómez said. “IWCA currently has 10 winery members from six different countries and is open to wineries globally who recognize that climate change is the most significant threat facing the wine industry and that immediate action is needed through innovative carbon reduction programs.”

Everything Familia Torres does as a winery, it approaches with social, environmental and economic sustainability in mind, including its digital strategy.

“The 3DEXPERIENCE platform is helping to achieve our sustainability goals as they are integrated into the requirements sets managed in the briefings for each project,” Gómez said. “For example, the platform helps deliver the insights to reduce our packaging carbon footprint, allowing us to choose packaging with the minimal weight requirements and fewest parts and materials. There is the saying ’the best packaging is no packaging,’ but, of course, you need to fulfill minimal functional protection standards to avoid damage during delivery. The 3DEXPERIENCE platform also helps to optimize the logistical configurations for transport, such as the pallet set ups.”

As it looks to the future, Familia Torres takes the stewardship of the Earth seriously, and hopes to continue to pave the way for sustainable wineries while protecting its legacy.

“At Torres, we understand sustainability in its wider sense and pass on our values of excellence from one generation to the next,” Gómez said. “We firmly believe in social, environmental and economic sustainability and will continue to combine the tradition we have inherited with constant innovation to lead the future.”