Offley Forrester

Forrester & C:a., S.A.

The foundation of the company is officially recognized as being 1737. There are no documents that show any dates before that, but the current idea is that there is some evidence of its existence in 1710. The Offley family has its origin before 1517, the year that William Offley was elected Lord Mayor and Sheriff of Stafford, while his brother was Lord Mayor in Chester. In 1556 his son William was elected Knight Man and became Lord Mayor of London. The succession in the Offley family continued through the dynasties of the Tudor and Stuart families, keeping high civilian positions, also being high noticeable their links to the Merchant Taylors company. In 1737, the seventh William Offley entered the company that got the name Etty Offley & Ca., in Oporto. From then on, new partners have been in and out, but the name Offley remained. Linked to Offley, appear the names Campion, Brooks, Hesketh, Webber and Cramp, and finally in 1803, an Offley became part of the company.

The first Forrester to have arrived in Oporto, was a Scotsman from Perth, James Forrester. He entered the company in 1803, and it became to be called Offley Forrester. A great person was his nephew Joseph James Forrester, who joined the company in 1831. Joseph was a genius, not only as a wine expert, but also because of his great personality, which allowed him to correct the abuse coming from the existence of a Port Wine monopoly. Perhaps his more noticeable job was in the cartography field. Until then, there were no maps of the Douro region, and he decided to end this situation by drawing a map from the Spanish border until Oporto, which was recognized as being precise in all aspects. Despite this work having taken twelve years to make, he did not stop and started a no less important task - the geological studies of the Port Wine region and the elaboration of its respective map. By an irony of the destiny, in 1861, this giant was swallowed by the river he loved so much. He had many insignias, the most important of them was the title Baron of Forrester, granted by the king of Portugal, and many other Portuguese awards and medals. He was also distinguished with insignias in Spain, Italy, France and Germany. His sons stayed in the company until 1924.

In 1962 Sandeman bought Offley and 1983 Martini bought 50% of the shares. When Martini a few years later bought 20% of the shares in Sogrape it was paid by handling over Forrester’s shares and Forrester came under the command of Ferreira. Sogrape took charge of Offley in 1997.

The Quinta Boa Vista estate overlooking the river Douro is one of the best-known ‘Quintas’ in the Port wine district. Grapes were bought from this quinta since the 1820s and acquired this property in 1866 from Barao de Viamonte. There, the Baron of Forrester planted his vines using the best varieties of grapes, which were specially selected for vintage type.

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