Interesting article
in today’s Diario de Jerez
Arrumbadores. A lovely word. These are the people who move
the butts around the bodega and perform the tasks of saca e rocio (running the scales -extracting
wine and refilling the butts), a very important job in the Sherry business.
This is about the arrumbadores of the 1950s and 60s. The Civil War, closely
followed by the Second World War paralysed the Sherry business, and the 1950s
saw a resurgence of business, consolidated in the 1960s when the old markets
were re-established.
The famous writer on Sherry, Julian Jeffs came to Jerez to
work in bodegas during this period, in 1956, and witnessed the rebirth of the
Almacenistas and the rude arrival of Rumasa. These had been hungry times, and a
rebirth was more than welcome. In the bodegas, squads of arrumbadores did their
daily work under the watchful eye of the capataz (cellarmaster) who was king.
There were thousands of them, always in charge, demanding and disciplined, with
great tasting ability, their hats pulled down and sashes to protect themselves
from lumbago – easily incurred from the hard work.
The good capataz was usually a bit older and had to be more
experienced and wiser. One, Luis Valle Saborido spent all his working life with
Sandeman and after 37 years became capataz, but not before receiving classes in
enology and microbiology. Capataces are like that; they don’t boast, but expect
some respect. They jealously supervised their teams which consisted of a
chargehand, two officials and an apprentice. These were burly men, their
sleeves rolled up and wearing black sashes tightly round their kidneys,
carrying metal jars hither and thither.
All the while, the capataz would
keep an eye on the erection of the rows of butts up to three and even four
high, the substitution of faulty ones, their loading and unloading from
transport, topping-up, moving wine to fresh butts, and other work requiring
great effort and skill. Without them the ageing of the wine would have been
impossible, but modernisation quickly wiped them from the map.
The bodegas then transferred this
lost tradition to the Fiesta de la Vendimia celebrations as a nostalgic competition,
with teams from various bodegas competing against each other. Beforehand, an
experienced arrumbador would explain the tactics to a young capataz who in turn
would teach his squad.
Gonzalez Byass, like many firms
had a paternalistic attitude to their staff. The firm had a company store which
supplied staff with basic products at cost price, such as clothing and later
on, white goods. When GB then did a deal with car maker Seat, the town filled
up with Seat 600s. The bodegas had a deal with builders who sold housing to 20%
of the staff at easy rates. They even had a company doctor, since the XIX
century who visited the workers' families on occasion.
Workers’children would have
priority to fill their father’s vacated post. On the death of a worker, the
bodega would offer employment to his son or work in bottling to his widow. In
cases of advanced age, the widow would receive a small pension.
Domecq had a company shop with
goods at half price. They even promoted education grants to those who could
show their children had the necessary skills, not to mention an in-house
doctor, and help with purchasing a home.
The arrumbadores worked from 8-12
then from 2-6, Monday to Saturday when they would be paid. To mitigate the
poverty and misery during the hungry years of unemployment post war, the
bodegas would employ half the work force one week and the other half the other
week.
Work was hard, and inevitably the
odd glass of wine was drunk, without the capataz knowing obviously. One trick
was the “monkey”, a bottle small enough to go through the butt’s bung hole on a
string. Another – cruder – way was to use the tube for transferring wine to
drink from. GB put a stop to this theft of wine by giving everyone a bottle of
wine or a voucher for the equivalent value after work every day.
In those days a job in the bodegas was thought to be for life, but technology put an end to that - and the arrumbadores - from the end of the 1960s. Sherry would soon go through its worst times.
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