Susana Balbo: Decanter Hall of Fame 2024

Susana Balbo is not a woman you easily forget. Visionary, pioneering, courageous, perseverant and strong are just a clutch of the adjectives regularly used to describe her. But if you meet Susana, it’s her silent command of a room and her steady, focused gaze that will stop you in your tracks.

Although elegant in appearance and petite in stature, Susana has a formidable presence. The tremendous respect she commands today, now in her late 60s, is both hard earned and hard fought.

This year’s recipient of our Decanter Hall of Fame Award, the latest in a roll-call of great names in the wine world, Susana Balbo didn’t just break the glass ceiling for women in South America, she completely shattered it, becoming a role model for generations to follow.

And regardless of her gender, she has masterfully achieved exceptional milestones – facing often unfathomable challenges along the way.

Scroll down to read more about Susana’s extraordinary career

Intuition for innovation

Susana’s winemaking story has an unlikely start. Although she was born in Argentina’s wine capital – the mountain city of Mendoza – her parents worked in textiles. Her aspiration as a young adult was to study nuclear physics; wine wasn’t part of the plan.

But fate intervened, in the way it often does, and the economic turmoil and political unrest of late-1970s Argentina scuppered her plans to study further afield. Instead, she signed up for the most science-driven course she could take locally: winemaking.

Although other women started the course with her, Susana was the lone female to make it to the end. Her perseverance set a new precedent – she became the first female winemaker in South America. She also graduated top of her class.

None of which made the reality of being Argentina’s only female winemaker any easier. To make things worse, the country was still in crisis and jobs were particularly hard to come by. She spent months experiencing rejection as she looked for work.

‘I was one of 89 applicants for Michel Torino,’ says Susana of the job she eventually pipped 88 men to the post for. ‘We spent three months interviewing. There were so many tests – even psychological ones!’

The owners picked Susana as their first choice, but not without warning her that women were either ‘very good, or very bad at their jobs – never in the middle’, as she recalls. She was given a trial period of one month in which to prove herself.

And prove herself she did. The then 25-year-old moved more than 1,000km from her home to the remote mountain village of Cafayate. After days travelling on winding mountain roads, she arrived at an outdated, decaying winery with no electricity and a cellar full of oxidised wines.

‘The wines tasted horrible!’ she says, recoiling in horror even now. ‘There were so many problems.’

Her smart, rebellious streak kicked in. She called the regulatory body and begged them not to visit her for three months. ‘I knew what I had to do, but 90% of the winemaking processes were forbidden. It was the only way I could save the wines!’

Using her aptitude for science and enthusiasm for technology, she salvaged the wines and put a plan in place to ensure the same mistakes would never be committed again.

She brought stainless steel tanks along the mountain roads and when truck drivers refused to ferry materials from Mendoza across the treacherous Andean pass, she learned how to modify her car and did it herself. Susana was unstoppable.

Although she revolutionised the red wines, it was her transformation of the region’s principal white grape that earned her the moniker ‘Queen of Torrontés’.

‘I didn’t have much choice – 70% of the vineyard was Torrontés!’ she says with a laugh. But in reality, Susana took what was an unloved variety, infamous for being bitter and bland, and chiselled it into a crisp, fragrant white wine – in the process making it a bona fide Argentinian icon.

Susana Balbo at a glance

Born: 9 April 1956, Mendoza

Studied: Winemaking at Don Bosco technical college (graduated 1981)

Wine career: Michel Torino (1981- 1989); Lovaglio Balbo (1990-1994); consultant winemaker (1995-2001); Martins Winery production director (1996-1998); Bodegas Esmeralda (1999-2002); Susana Balbo Wines, formerly Dominio del Plata (1999-today)

Political career: President of Wines of Argentina (2006-2008, 2008-2010, 2014-2015); WofA vice-president (2010-2012, 2012-2014); congresswoman for Mendoza (2015-2019); chair of Women20 Summit

Family: Two children, José Lovaglio (age 40) and Ana Lovaglio (38)

Interests: Reading, travelling, horse riding, time with her grandchildren

Up for the challenge

In the early days, she bucked the trend for carbon fining of white wines and carried out Argentina’s first experiment with enzymes – clarification enzymes used in the production of apple juice, as they were the only ones available – instead. ‘It was a big risk,’ she admits, ‘but it worked!’

Susana continues to transform and push the quality of Torrontés, notably planting it in the Uco Valley and ageing it in untoasted oak barrels for the top wines of her eponymous brand today.

‘Torrontés is just one example of her brilliant winemaking, and she has made the finest I have tasted,’ says Toby Morrhall, a UK wine buyer who began working with Susana in 1996. ‘Torrontés is sometimes excessively aromatic and not easy to drink. [But Susana achieves] beautiful essential oil-like aromas, as found in orange peel, without astringency.

This is a superb technical achievement that transcends the limitations of the Torrontés variety. She has a relentless thirst for the latest research and technology, and her ability and determination are transparently obvious.’

She has been at the forefront of Argentina’s new premium white wine movement and while she admits she has a special fondness and is ‘grateful to Torrontés, as it put me on the map’, Susana is actually far more of a red wine woman. Cabernet Sauvignon is her favourite grape variety to make – even above Argentina’s signature Malbec.

Why Cabernet? ‘I guess I like the challenge… There are many great Cabernet Sauvignons all over the world, whereas we have no competitors with Malbec.’ Never afraid to throw down the gauntlet, she adds: ‘I like to challenge myself to make a wine that can stand up to other wines of the world.’

Skills beyond the cellar

Susana’s tenacity and skill as a winemaker gained her prestigious winemaking posts in Argentina and as a consultant abroad. But she never stayed in her comfort zone for long, instead challenging herself to take on greater responsibility, venturing bravely into the business of wine and becoming one of Argentina’s first female winery founders.

What makes these achievements even more impressive are the hurdles she overcame to reach them. Her time in Salta ended in frustration and deprivation after the then-new owners ‘didn’t pay me a whole year of my salary’, which Susana says forced her to move back to Mendoza, babes in arms, to start again.

She experienced painful personal rejection when her parents founded a winery with her brother, leaving her out of the family business.

And Susana has had to pick up the pieces from her own two wineries – one with her first ex-husband, which went under after they were scammed in 1994 during Argentina’s period of hyperinflation; and subsequently having to buy out her second ex-husband when their differences became too great to work together, as a result of which she took on the winery single-handed. Put simply, Susana doesn’t give up.

‘I have had some traumatic experiences and challenges,’ she reflects. ‘But I am a positive person. It is only when you are challenged in life that you can realise certain talents. I believe things happen for a reason.’

This attitude and drive is what her closest colleagues recall. ‘Susana has always been a woman of strength and great confidence,’ affirms Mariano di Paolo, who worked with her at Bodegas Esmeralda (now Catena Zapata) in the early 1990s. ‘She was always challenging herself to move forward and continues to drive forward today.’

Susana herself attributes this drive to her great faith – as a devout Catholic. ‘My life has had its ups and downs, but my faith has driven me,’ she says. ‘I think God never gives you more challenges than you can handle. You should never surrender.’

Four women Susana admires

Mother Teresa

‘She’s a saint and gave everything to people who had absolutely nothing. The generosity and empathy she had for other people is incomparable.’

Indira Ghandi

‘When she needed to solve the problems she had, the United Nations left her alone to solve the problems – and she did.’

Jancis Robinson MW

‘She settled herself as an authority in the wine world.’

Helen Turley

‘She was the first to change the style of Zinfandel, and in some way I identify myself with her journey.’

Ambition for change

Another of her callings has been in the political arena – bringing change to the wine industry, for Argentina and for women. She campaigned hard to become the first female president of Wines of Argentina (WofA): ‘Nobody wanted to vote for me… The big wineries all tried to convince me not to do it. But I have never been afraid of what other people think about me.’

Instead, she went to the small growers, listened to their concerns and gained their trust. She won the presidency.

By the end of her term, she had left such an impression that she was voted in unanimously as president twice more.

In her time as president, Susana tripled membership, profoundly grew WofA’s international presence and, most importantly, helped to ‘sell Argentina’ – with a series of visionary marketing campaigns that not only showed the beauty of the wine regions, but the culture of Argentina: its tango, mountains and gastronomy.

‘We made Argentina exist as a category internationally!’

Helping to open eyes to Argentinian wine is clearly one of the greatest sources of pride for Susana, but her political ambitions didn’t stop there. From 2015, she served as congresswoman for Mendoza – following another hard-fought campaign.

She started with grand ambitions, but the stagnant, corrupt nature of the political arena saddened her: ‘I thought in politics I could do what we did with WofA, but I realised it was impossible – politicians only work for themselves.’

She did, however, at the request of then President Mauricio Macri, stay on to take on the role of chair of W20 (Women20), as part of the G20 Summit in 2018. ‘I was really proud of what we did in that time.’ It was one of the highlights of her life, she says, ‘to fight for women’s rights, without being a feminist’.

Securing the future

Susana’s desire to have an impact resonates at all levels. ‘Susana is a strong woman, as everyone knows,’ says Edy del Popolo, who has been working closely with her for more than a decade as general manager of Susana Balbo Wines, which employs more than 110 people today and produces two million bottles annually.

‘But along with her courage, she also has great sensitivity and is very generous. These are characteristics that many people don’t know about Susana. It perhaps feels like a contrast to her strength, but she takes care of her employees in a way you wouldn’t believe.’

Part of this care is now to hand the family businesses over to her children, Ana and José, as well as her trusted team, so the businesses can continue to thrive in the future.

‘She has always taught us that there is no shortcut, nor an easy path – that success is 99% sweat and 1% inspiration,’ says daughter Ana, who manages tourism at their winery, three restaurants and luxury hotel.

‘I feel very privileged to have grown up being taught by her that there are no limits to what you can do. But she also taught us to focus on others – if the community doesn’t grow around the winery, there is no point to it.’

It’s this tender side of the formidable Susana Balbo, a professional I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing several times over the past two decades, that radiates most vibrantly today. At peace enjoying her family and confident in her legacy.

Her gaze is still strong, her presence is still commanding, and Susana Balbo is utterly unforgettable. She is a true legend of South American wine, who did it her way.

Related articles

• Pascaline Lepeltier: Decanter Rising Star 2024
• Dirk Niepoort: Decanter Hall of Fame 2023
• Rosa Kruger: Decanter Hall of Fame 2022