Taralas Family

The wine tradition of the Tarala family has deep roots in history, which began its “journey” into the magical world of wine at the end of the 19th century, with the love of wine being passed down from generation to generation and today paving its way to the future.

The History

It all started with Nikolaos Taralas, grandfather of the current owner of the Estate, Dimitris Taralas, who came from Eastern Romilia.
A visionary and restless spirit, he created the family’s first vineyard there, planting the first “seed” of the long history that would follow, while together with his brother Athanasios, they indulged in the vaccination of the vine, in an attempt to combat phylloxera. When the population exchange took place in 1925, Nikolaos Taralas remained in Eastern Romilia. However, one of his children, Christos Taralas, left to Greece, as did Nikolaos’ brother, Athanasios.

In fact, until Athanasios Taralas created his new nursery in Greece, the first vines planted on Greek soil by the family came from the grafted estates in Eastern Romilia, which Nikolaos Taralas had sent to the motherland.

When in 1935 the phylloxera also appeared in Greece and almost the entire Greek vineyard was damaged by the disease, the only ones that remained unscathed were the vaccinated plants sent by Nikolaos Taralas. This is how a vineyard of hundreds of acres was created in Agia Varvara Imathia, where Christos Taralas was settled. With the “miracle” vines as a tool and utilizing his family’s knowledge of cultivation and production, he created a business of production, winemaking and marketing of vine products in the city of Veria. In fact, the amount that his company managed to sell before the war was estimated at around 200 tons of wine. World War II, however, brought the business to an inglorious end.

During the Occupation, its assets were confiscated and its course was abruptly interrupted, while Christos Taralas breathed his last literally among the grapes at the age of only 37. Today, part of the equipment of that company is preserved, which included wooden barrels with a capacity of 6.5 tons each – four of them are preserved – and linoleums (presses) of 20 and 10 tons respectively.

Today

But the love Christos Taralas had for wine was not left without a successor. His son Dimitris Taralas, although he followed a different path (he was an employee of the Bank of Greece), did not stop working on the cultivation of the vine and the vinification of small quantities of wine for family use and in fact in a traditional way. After his retirement and in continuation of the family wine tradition, worked hard to see history come alive again, he took up the mito of wine creation from where his father had left him. Thus, realizing a lifelong dream, he decided to create a modern winery in 2006, in collaboration with his wife Aspasia and with the help of his twin children, Christos and Nikoleta.

Presence abroad

The wines of the Taralas Estate travel beyond Greece, as the company opened its “wings” in important foreign markets as well. Its labels are found in the markets of Australia, USA, Taiwan, Canada, France, The Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Finland, Cyprus among others. The company also produces other products-derivatives of the vine, such as vine leaves, which, in addition to their presence in Greece, are exported to Dubai and England.