Franconia: VDP City winery Klingenberg to be sold

In a couple of years, the 100th anniversary could be celebrated there, at the Bavarian Untermain. Could, however...

…there is a city council resolution, according to which the winery is not supposed to be anything more than a communal firm. In other words: The city, that prefers to conceal this issue, is looking for a buyer. Or maybe for more than one buyer. The city winery is member of the VDP, does not have a bad reputation and has had many successful awards. This seems to not be enough for the city council.

Currently nobody knows what will become of the winery. A possible buyer, the Bürgstadt top vintager Paul Fürst (Winery Rudolf Fürst) already declined. He has been active on 1,3 hectares of the Klingenberg Schlossberg with his son Sebastian for a couple of years and knows the difficult conditions in the landmarked terraces. Furthermore, he has already invested in cellar construction plan. Even if he bought only parts of it, he knows: "The Klingenberg colleagues are not very happy about a newbie".

However, it will be hard to find a buyer nearby that will engage in the communal part of the Schlossberg, since there is no structures in 180-hectare-large region, away from the "normal" Franconia. There remains the hope for an investor from far away - or a change of mind of the city council. If none of those will happen, the plant will have to suffer from the same fate as the former city winery in the nearby Erlenbach, which was on a flight of fancy in the 80s under the then manager Hermann Mengler (today viniculture advisor in Franconia) and which has now vanished into thin air. Let's hope that the Klingenberg winemakers will escape this fate. (r.knoll / translator c.siegel)