INTERNACIONALIZACIóN EN LAS BODEGAS FAMILIARES: UNA APLICACIóN EMPíRICA EN EL SECTOR DE LA RIOJA

This work analyses the reasons why family businesses in La Rioja (Spain) implement internationalization processes. Furthermore, it studies the factors linked to the intangible asset pool, which may be the companies’ source of competitive advantage in the target market or, on the contrary, hinder and restrain their international strategy.The empirical study was performed on a sample of twenty companies that belong to the Association of La Rioja Family Wineries. In short, a series of in-depth interviews, based on this study’s research objectives, were carried out on these companies’ directors, whether they are family or not.The results reveal that businesses with “a greater family nature” have a lower international commitment according to their percentage of international sales. Moreover, these businesses use different arguments to justify their internationalization and the intangible asset pool to implement it also shows certain differences.