THE BRAND

The Marquisat de Sainte-Marie estate, where the distillery is located, once housed a sugar refinery (the Espérance plantation). It was transformed into a distillery by Louis Philippe Henry Longueteau in 1895, making it the oldest distillery still operating in Guadeloupe. The distillery owns its own sugarcane crops, including blue sugarcane, but it also owns its own machinery, which allows for a controlled harvest over time, especially when it reaches a satisfactory brix level. The property is divided into 12 monoculture plots, which means that each one has either blue sugarcane or red sugarcane, the two varieties used by Longueteau. In total, there are 70 hectares where the sugarcane grows, with a view to limiting chemical treatments, by using vinasse to enrich the soil, as well as a ground cover using bagasse, which reduces plant growth. Fermentation lasts 48 hours and distillation is carried out on a 28-plate Savalle column, with an output of between 70 and 80%.