Interview with Giuseppe Morreale, Plant Director, Sella & Mosca Spa.
 
  
Sella & Mosca, a primary wine Company within Campari Group, has chosen Procomac packaging to supply of a low-level empty glass bottles depalletiser. 
They recently renewed their trust in Procomac Packaging with the order of a high-level infeed 
palletiser AGILIS 1000. The line can treat cartons of glass bottles in various formats.
 
Mr. Morreale, please could you tell us about the main events of this historic brand of the Italian wine industry that nowadays belongs to CAMPARI, one of the most important groups in the International scene?
Company Sella & Mosca was established in 1899 in Alghero, Sardinia by 2 cousins from Piedmont (Northern Italia); they drained the marshy areas, developing a 600 hectares estate into an agricultural village producing citruses, vegetables and vines. 
In the early 50's Sella & Mosca started the production of wines for the local market. In the late 50's they moved the filling activity to the current site - I Piani - and started the production of "Coral Rosato" a sweet and sparkling rosé wine of fairly good quality. 
But it was only in 1976, when the company was bought by Bassetti first and Bonomi later, that Sella & Mosca started the production on a bigger scale. Some of the most important selections of white wines such as Torbato, Terre Bianche, Vermentino La Cala, were created, that also today are very much appreciated. 
After this first results with white wines the company focused its attention to the red wines, using grapes like Merlot, Cabernet, Cannonau and Carignano, creating the well-known Marchese di Villa Marina, Raim, Tancafarra, Terre Rare Doc. Medeus is the latest of those red wines. 
A careful and peculiar handling is reserved to Anghelu Ruju, a "meditation wine" , produced exlusively from Cannonau grapes: bunches are collected very late, are placed on mats, protected from the night humidity, and turned by hand at irregular intervals according to the environmental temperatures and other features. 
Anghelu Ruju requires very particularly favourable conditions and it is produced only in the best years. 
Sella & Mosca was always receptive to technology innovation: for example and for over 20 years now the fermentation of all wines has been carried out under controlled temperature, with a cellar conditioning system controlled by computer.

How important is the filling technology for Sella & Mosca?
A production company with foresight should always invest in the technological innovation: the existing filling line has been recently renewed and updated both concerning the production and layout aspects. Further to the new filling/capping bloc a new low level outfeed depalettiser, supplied by Procomac, has been installed, together with new bottle conveyors integrated with a synchronization system. This year a new end-of-line system from Procomac with a high-level infeed palletizer will be placed. 
These new systems are paramount to optimize the production flow, making the optimum use of each machine, and lowering the noise level of the whole line: today thanks to Procomac we have reached a noise level under 80 dB.
The goal we set for the new palletizer is to simplify operator's interventions and speed up format changeover operations, as this line works with 13 types of carton packages featuring different labels.

How do you evaluate the service activity of Procomac Packaging?
Positively. Sella & Mosca can rely upon has very highly-skilled internal staff, and by co-operating with technical staff of Procomac Packaging we could reach important goals: for example we have optimized restarting procedures of the line in case of stops. Recently a remote control system has been installed on the line to shorten up intervention times in case of line stops.

What about future developments and how is 2005 harvest going to be?
Sella & Mosca is an open-minded company which reserves great importance to marketing and communication: for over 15 years we have been organizing visits to our cellars with tasting of wine and local food. The old farmers' structures have been restructured at the end of the 80's the two Villas of the first 2 owners'.
We will go on "cuddling" our visitors who normally become also customers. 
From the technology point of view we will continue improving the production line. Recently a new cellar has been built up for small productions of high -quality wines with a new control system for barrels humidity and temperature. A further development will be the automatisation of a small packing line for export orders with special packages (Japan, Brazil). 
As regards the grape harvest 2005, I prefer not to express forecasts, since a good season depends on many factors: nowadays the grape collection is not carried out as it was before: it is fully automated thanks to a long-time experience; anyway a small hailstorm can still destroy the work of an entire year.