Manuel Ramirez and António Feu exchanged an emotional hug on Saturday, May 24, the 6th anniversary of the Portimão Museum. In that embrace, the past and future of the canning industry was symbolized.
Representing the past was António Feu and the place itself, the former Feu Hermanos factory, where one of the top products was the “La Rose” preserves, and which today is the museum. The future was represented by businessman Manuel Ramirez, whose company decided to relaunch the prestigious brand «La Rose» on the market.
As José Gameiro, scientific director of the Portimão Museum, said to Sul Informação, it is not every day that, as there, "the connection of the industrial heritage to the current canning industry" happens.
The company itself, Ramirez & Cª (Filhos) SA, is almost a museum piece, were it not for its continuous dynamism, since it is the oldest company in the world operating in the fish canning sector.
The «La Rose» preserves, with a box inspired by the old image of the brand, were given to be tasted in several versions, at their launch at the Museu de Portimão, on Saturday, with the help of «Mary of the Sea", the store good gourmet food canned food and snacks located downtown, where these high quality preserves – sardines, mackerel, tuna and specialties – are already on sale.
Despite all the revivalism and symbolism of the moment, there is, however, a big difference – it is that, unlike the XNUMXth century, when «La Rose» was produced at the Feu Hermanos factory in Portimão, with fish caught in the Algarve sea , is now produced at the factories of Ramirez & Cª (Filhos) SA, in Matosinhos, in Northern Portugal.
No more boats and factories
Manuel G. Ramirez, chairman of the board of directors, explained to Sul Informação that «unfortunately, the Algarve no longer has canning factories». And the few that are still resisting (in Olhão), do not mean, in the entrepreneur's opinion, that there is “a revival of canned food in the Algarve, unfortunately”.
Because, he explains, “in order to have preserves, there must be boats. The disappearance of canned food in the Algarve was caused by the disappearance of the fleet. In our case, from Ramirez [who had factories in Vila Real de Santo António], tuna fishing first disappeared, later on the purse seine fishing».
«A few decades ago there were hundreds of boats and 84 factories in the Algarve. I still lived that time…», recalls, with some nostalgia, the patriarch of Ramirez, born in the capital of the Guadiana.
“The truth is that when the boats disappeared, namely with the end of the Portugal-Spain fisheries agreement, the factories disappeared. Then the boats returned, but when they went to fish for sardines, there were no more factories and the siege died. Today there is only to supply the fresh market, for sardines and restaurants».
And can the canning industry be able to return in force to the Algarve, now that there is so much talk about the Economy of the Sea? “For this, there must be a strategy and a project, there must be investors. Maybe that way we could have a revitalization of the industry».
a friendship story
And how did this idea of relaunching a brand that already had enormous prestige, nationally and internationally, came about?
“The Feu and Ramirez families have a long history of friendship throughout the 2013th century. In a conversation in XNUMX with my friend António Feu, I talked about the possibility of relaunching the “La Rose” brand, an idea that he welcomed with great enthusiasm».
António Feu, for his part, was “very emotional” about the relaunch of the brand and, on top of that, at the museum that lives in the place where the Feu Hermanos factory used to be.
«I am very pleased and honored with the recovery of the “La Rose” brand by Manuel Ramirez, who is a longtime friend, since our families were friends, both of Spanish origin and pioneers in the canning sector», he added, in statements to our newspaper.
The cannery entrepreneur Manuel G. Ramirez and his children, who accompany him in the family business, were also particularly happy on Saturday. After all, it's not every day that what, since the 70s, was just a museum piece.
«There is an intertwining here between this Museum, which shows the maximum exponent of what was the canning industry in Portimão, and the actuality of a brand. Here we celebrate the imagination of a great name in this land and we pay homage to all those who worked here and made it great», said the businessman.
«I was born in the Algarve and it is with emotion that I share with the Museum of Portimão, and with Vila Real de Santo António, the memory of the canning industry».
And what does Manuel Ramirez (son) think about this association between the brand and the museum? "It's fundamental! there is a win-win perfect, which fits the profile and policy of Conservas Ramirez. We have 14 brands, many of them within the La Rose profile».
Crossing of goodwill
On the other hand, the representative of this new generation of industrial canning, underlined, in the cardboard boxes of the «La Rose» preserves (the cardboards), there is a reference, in Portuguese and English: «Visit the Museum of Portimão, where La Rose was born!".
Therefore, he underlined, «there is a cross de good wishes», a crossroads of goodwill.
For José Gameiro, director of the Museum, "it makes perfect sense" this connection between industrial heritage and the current canning industry, "because it is a way of projecting this memory into the future." “It's a renovation and a life that gives itself to the whole history and culture that existed in this house and that we try to preserve in the museum”. Basically, as Ramirez herself mentioned in a press release, it is «make the historiography of a living brand».
"There is an interesting paradigm here to change: trying to bring museums closer together, as laboratories of ideas, as observatories of the cities where they are located, and to be aware of this type of movement in civil society."
Taking into account that the brand will be exported all over the world, starting with the Orient, «who knows if one day a tourist from Hong Kong doesn't come to the Portimão Museum because of the “La Rose” preserves?”
Veja here more pictures the relaunch of «La Rose» and the anniversary of the Museum.
Comments