Valados de Melgaço

Corridor footprint

Valados de Melgaço grew out of a family grape business. In an interview republished on the company’s website, Artur Meleiro — born on Quinta de Golães, a hillside property in Melgaço, and a management consultant for more than 20 years — explains that the family had sold red and white grapes in bulk since his grandfather’s time, and that he and a cousin and partner turned the family’s long-held plan for its own wine into two brands: Valados de Melgaço, for single-variety Alvarinho, and Quinta de Golães, from a four-hectare plot on the property where he was born. According to that interview, the Valados wines draw about 30% of their grapes from Quinta de Golães and the rest from his father, an uncle and around a dozen hand-picked growers in the sub-region, and are vegan, made without animal-protein products — a concept Meleiro said was unfamiliar in Portugal, “but we cannot say the same of the Nordic countries or Canada.” The company, Valados de Melgaço, Lda, was incorporated on 21 October 2015 with share capital of €60,000 and is registered for the production, import, export and sale of wines, sparkling wines and aguardentes, with its registered office in Alvaredo and its winery in Paderne. Its current range includes the Alvarinho Reserva, an Alvarinho made without added sulphites, an Alvarinho Espumante Reserva Extra Bruto, a Grande Reserva and the Quinta de Golães white and red.

Exports have long been part of the plan. Between June 2017 and June 2019 the company ran a NORTE 2020 internationalisation project (NORTE-02-0752-FEDER-025760), with €147,361 of eligible spending and €66,312.45 of ERDF support, to win new foreign customers through a digital presence, promotional material, market studies, trips and trade fairs; its news archive records an appearance at ProWein 2017 in Düsseldorf. In Sweden, Systembolaget’s sales-per-article lists show that the Valados de Melgaço Alvarinho Reserva (article 9501601, SEK 199) sold 3,276.75 litres in 2024 — about 4,370 bottles — and 2,679 litres, about 3,570 bottles, in 2025. The product search now lists the 2024 vintage under the same article number in the temporary assortment from 23 October 2026, supplied by The WineAgency Sweden AB; it is that importer’s only Portuguese wine in Systembolaget’s current range.

Why this matters for the corridor

Valados de Melgaço shows the repeat-release route a small Portuguese producer can build at the Swedish monopoly: one Alvarinho, recorded sales in two consecutive years and a third season starting in October 2026. On Swedish shelves it competes with better-known Monção e Melgaço names such as Soalheiro, Anselmo Mendes and Quintas de Melgaço, all present in Systembolaget’s current range, and its vegan positioning is one its founder has explicitly pitched at Nordic buyers. It launches on the same day as Casal da Coelheira and Quinta das Maias.

Sources: nif.pt and racius.com (NIF 513736719); valadosdemelgaco.pt (company page, news archive, interview “Em Melgaço nascem vinhos vegan por amor ao alvarinho”, NORTE 2020 project sheet); Systembolaget product search API (article 9501601, 4 October 2026); Systembolaget “Försäljning per artikel” lists for 2024 and 2025. Spotted an error? Email miguel@fractio.se.