90 years of history link the Cardoso family to the Amorim Group. From Mesão Frio to Meladas, from the farm to the factories, and including the local neighbourhood. Memories of dances, corn husking and excursions. Decades of hard work and intense dedication. “A great family life”, along the way. A family that everyone proudly describes as having been “always united”.
To tell the story of the Cardoso family, we have to return to the origins. To journey up the River Douro, to Mesão Frio, in Vila Real. It was here, in 1970, during one of their business visits to this small village, that José and Joaquim Amorim first met Manuel Pinto Cardoso and Ermelinda Lopes. Manuel and Ermelinda “used to till the land, in the estates of farmers who sold cork to Amorim”. José and Joaquim were looking for someone to look after their family farm in Meladas. This led to “the agreement” that changed the lives of the Cardoso family forever.
Manuel and Ermelinda left Mesão Frio that same year, with “their youngest children, who hadn’t yet started working”: Fernando, Joaquim, António, Celestino and Francisco. They were soon followed by four other children, Idalina, Alice, José Luís and José Manuel, in that order. That was the agreement, although we don’t know whether it was “written or verbal”. The Cardoso moved to Meladas on the condition that they would “bring their married and unmarried children”, who would help them in the field, “and would also start to work for the Amorim family’s companies”. And that’s how it happened. In the early 1970s, with the exception of Celestino and Francisco, all of Manuel Cardoso’s and Ermelinda Lopes’ younger children and their two sons-in-law, Zé, who was married to Alice, and Manuel, who was married to Idalina, started to work in the factories . One after the other, almost all of them started to work for Corticeira Amorim Indústria, now called Amorim Cork Composites. Only Fernando and António stayed at the Floor & Wall Coverings Unit, now called Amorim Cork Flooring. José Almeida, one of Manuel and Ermelinda’s sons-in-law, worked at Corticeira Amorim Indústria for 37 years. “He was the lord of the mountains” and “also a shoemaker for all the other members of staff”. António Martins Pereira, the second son-in-law, worked in the granulating operations. José Luís, one of the oldest children, operated “the BL2 press, which at the time they called it the block press”. He worked for the company during almost four decades, until he retired. Also at Corticeira Amorim, his brother, José Manuel, now 74, did a little bit of everything. “I worked from the gate entrance to the rear section of the factory”. “I still have friends there,” he says. Friendships from a time when “the mindset and spirit were different”. “It was another life. Another life where you worked a lot.” Even then, “more members of the family worked on the farm”, adds José Manuel. “We even had 23 oxen,” he says proudly. Cardoso “worked in the factory and, at the end of his shift, went to the farm”. Dona Ermelinda and Mr. Manuel “of the farm”, as Manuel Cardoso was fondly known in the local area. They had no direct salary but could use everything that the farm gave them. “They could have all the cattle they wanted” and they earned money from selling the animals and fruit. They carried on working like that for “nine to ten years”, until, with the arrival of old age, “they could no longer till the fields” and went to live with their daughter Idalina, in the Amorim neighbourhood. Happy memories from the farm are worth “everything” explains José Manuel with a smile. “We met the children of Dona Margarida, Dona Luzia, Mr. Américo… everyone went there and we spent time with them”. Laurinda, José Manuel’s wife, recalls that “these were good times, especially for the children”.
There was never a shortage of children in the Cardoso family. Their nine children produced a dozen grandchildren. More than a dozen cousins of the Cardoso family grew up in the Meladas farm. Little by little, the members of the Cardoso family began to “have their own houses in the Amorim neighbourhood”, the most striking memories were spent in the Quinta de Meladas farm”, says Luís Cardoso, José
Manuel’s son. “We came back home to sleep, but all our life was spent on the farm”, he recalls. In the case of Luís, this couldn’t be truer because, that’s where he was born, 48 years ago. “There was no time to go to Oleiros hospital”. Teresa and Ana Paula, Idalina Cardoso’s daughters, remember their childhood on the farm with “great nostalgia”. “We could do anything, they were beautiful times”, recalls Ana Paula. Teresa, now 49, has vivid memories of those days. “Walking with the oxen that pulled the carts. My grandfather would say - hold tight, don’t move! - I held a short stick in my hand and they remained still. Picking wild strawberries ... happy times and the family always together ”, she concludes. In turn, João Pedro, José Luís Cardoso’s son, remembers his grandmother “selling fruit” and “going to play football in a field that we had there”. Isabel, Alice Cardoso’s daughter, and Ivo, Fernando’s son, can’t remember much from this period. They are two of the younger cousins. But what Isabel lacks in memories, is more than compensated by her older sister, Maria do Céu. “I have a lot of memories! During our school holidays, my grandfather used to put us with a can and a little stick to scare away the birds in the corn field. I remember the ox carts, the pigs... we went with him to pick grass from the top of the ox cart, very comfortable. We helped out during the cork husking. Locally, everyone gave a helping hand”.
Although none of the Amorim family lived on the farm, it “was a meeting place”. It was always filled with people. “They offered the farm for summer camps”, and for ‘missionaries’. “Every year, excursions for seniors citizens were organised. They held big parties there. Tininha allowed them to use the farm. There were dances ... we can still remember them. We took part in everything”. Tininha was one of the Amorim sisters – Albertina - the middle sister, who Cardoso liked very much. “We always had a very close relationship with Tininha, while she was alive”, explains Maria do Céu. Ana Paula adds: “I liked her a lot and she loved me. I miss her. I miss her a lot ”. Of the ten Cardoso cousins who were raised on the farm, nine ended upworking at Amorim Cork Composites (ACC). Today, seven still work there: Luís, Teresa, Ana Paula, Maria do Céu, Isabel, João Pedro and Ivo. They work in the different parts of the factory. Maria do Céu is a receptionist, but she has done a little bit of everything in the company. She joined Amorim at the age of 17, and has been with the company for 32 years. “In the past, few women worked in the factory, just a few old ladies who would bake bags of granulated cork. They started employing more women when they opened the joint pavilion. We were known as the young girls, it was the youngest sector of Corticeira Amorim”, she fondly recalls. Her cousin Ana Paula also began in the assembly section. Today it is dedicated to “the assembly of memo boards”. She joined ACC at the age of 19, “to have social security rights”, today she’s 48. “Every moment I spend in the company is special for me. I like to work, I like doing what I do, I learn new things every day”. In the same sector of the company we also find Isabel and Teresa. Isabel is the coordinator of her sector. She is 44 years old and has been working for the group for 26 years. There is a simple philosophy about working with family members: “inside the company there are no cousins or uncles, we are all co-workers”. Her cousin Teresa has been working in the industry for 32 years. “If anyone has a doubt they come to talk with me”. “I really like what I do, I feel at home here”.
On the men’s side, we find Luís Cardoso, 46 years old. “I always said that I didn’t want to work here, and I really didn’t want to, but in 1995, when I returned from military service, I came here for an interview and ended up staying”. He has worked with ACC for 25 years. “Over the past quarter century there have been some difficult moments, such as 2009.“ That was when I put in charge of production and there was a global economic crisis. Back then “I entered work at 6 am and left late at night”. Nonetheless, he believes that “Without sacrifice, there is no passion”. It is exactly this passion that Luís believes is the secret of the group’s 150 years of business activity. João Pedro, 48, started working at ACC at the age 14. He subsequently left the company and then returned in 1994. “I was working in the cylinders section, then I went to the presses, I practically ran the entire factory and now I am a driver”. Ivo has been in the factory for the longest period of time. “I am 30 years old, I am almost from another generation”. He started on the floor and wall coverings unit, but in 2005, he joined the rest of his family. He works in the night shift, “laminating the blocks”. Over the course of several decades, the work at ACC “has changed a lot”, everyone agrees. João Pedro says that some of the key changes have been “the dimension of the factory”, and “safety, which has been increasingly reinforced”. Maria do Céu misses “the sense of union” and “complicity between colleagues”. “She will stay there for life, it’s many years working for the company”, concludes Isabel. Nowadays, the members of the Cardoso family always meet once a year, in the summer. “There are marriages with fewer people,” says Maria do Céu. This year the virus spoiled our plans.
