The Portuguese brand wine was created in 1944 by the company José Maria da Fonseca (Azeitãjo near Lisbon). The reason for this was that the American soldiers returning from Europe had taken a liking to lightly sparkling wine and the demand could be met by Portugal, which was not involved in the war. Lancers quickly became very popular in the USA and still is today. It was originally marketed in stone jugs.
The sweet, slightly sparkling rosé wine used to be carbonated, but this was later switched to production with natural foaming. At the end of the 1980s, a variant was introduced using the continuous flow method for sparkling wines invented in Russia. Together with the even more famous Mateus (which, incidentally, only came onto the market around two years later), Lancers developed into the second very successful Portuguese export hit.
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Egon Mark
Diplom-Sommelier, Weinakademiker und Weinberater, Volders (Österreich)