Pelle Lundborg: 'Our avocados from Carratraca are delivered directly to the Royal House of Sweden'

Pelle Lundborg was born in Sweden and is 47 years old, although he has been in Malaga almost longer than in his native country. An entrepreneur by nature, he started doing business at the age of 16. He was one of the founders of major companies in the video game sector such as Nordic Games and Embracer. Now that he has moved away from the world of technology, he has become an agricultural entrepreneur, with a powerful export line of ecological products, which he started with a trip to his country aboard his electric Tesla. The avocados he grows on his Carratraca farm even reach the Royal House of Sweden.

-You started working at a very young age.

-In Sweden it is very typical for children to do jobs like selling books to their neighbours at Christmas to earn some money or rewards. I did all that kind of thing to save money, because I liked the idea of entrepreneurship. When I was 14 I started working in a shop after school selling electronics and imported goods from Asia. When I was 16, I was a bit tired of school so I took the money I had and bought a small premises and started selling video games and role-playing games.

-And how did you make the leap to the video game industry?

-When the EU opened the free market in Europe, I started buying video games in England, and I also sold the first manga videos, in '94. Then in '98 I sold my shop to a friend and we set up Nordic Games, a chain of shops and mail order shops. In 2000 that company was sold to Game. But after a couple of years we started again in Sweden and in 2008 we started making our own video games. That's how in 2011 we bought JoWood, which later acquired the rights from THQ and became Embracer Group (today a publicly traded company with more than 3,000 employees).

-And what famous games did they make at that time?

-The most famous were Darksiders and Saints Row.

-From video games to agriculture, how did this career change happen?

-In 2016, just when the company went public, I was very sick for a year, in hospital. I was away for a long time and I realised that I had to do other things. Up until then, I was travelling and working a lot and my body told me I didn't want to do it anymore. And then I found an old finca in Carratraca that needed to be given a new lease of life. I had been living in Malaga since 2006. My father was an engineer and a pilot instructor, and my mother was an expert in mushrooms and plants: so first I lived my father's career and now I'm following my mother's path. I have always been very interested in the world of the countryside and agriculture.

-Is that why you founded the Solmark estate?

-We turned the farm around with the help of local people, because part of being organic is also employing local workers and what is in the area, and here we have found very good professionals. We grow everything: rain-fed almond and olive trees, avocados, citrus fruits, but with the difference that we use technology to use as little water as possible, and we mix it with ancient knowledge.

-And in 2019, you loaded your Tesla with avocados and drove them from Malaga to Sweden.

-Yes, we took them on a trip to start a direct sales line to households. Even the Royal House of Sweden receives a box of avocados every week. There are many people who are interested, because there are few tropical fruits available there and our product is organic. There are also people who live in places where there are no shops nearby, because Sweden is very big, but very few people live there. We also make olive oil and carry other products from small local producers.

-Why do you do it?

-You have to do good things, it's a moral ambition. And be a bit idealistic: we bring the best quality products to people who are looking for them. In the big chains there is a lot of waste. The fruit has to be picked at the right moment and there has to be a very short logistical chain so that it arrives quickly, even if it is by lorry. This is how the fruit reaches the consumer without intermediaries: I cut it from my tree, put it in the box and take it to your house within seven to ten days.

-Is there much difference between selling video games and avocados?

-Well, there is a difference, but you should always bring things in good condition, of good quality and as quickly as possible. Price is not always the most important thing. Another part of the experience is inviting clients to see the finca and to get to know the area: I send them to eat in the village, or in Ronda, or they go to the Caminito del Rey or Fuente de Piedra.

-And now you have bought a second finca also in Carratraca. What are you going to do with it?

-Yes, it's called La Moraleda and I bought it five years ago, but we are waiting for the licences from the local administration, which are a bit slow, to say the least. We are going to build a small hotel and a restaurant, and it will have an arboretum, to see rare plants. We have ten hectares with old olive trees and a holm oak forest, near the centre of the village.

-So after a lifetime of work you're still going?

-I mean, some people would have bought a big house and a yacht, but that's not for me. Ambition has to come from something else, you know what I mean? There are things that give purpose, for someone else or for yourself, for my children or for the whole world... I have to do things that I feel good about morally and that benefit society.