Cistercian wine-growing estate
With C at the beginning, with character inside
Character and charm, competence and creativity, expertise and esteem: All that is packed into our wines. You can even taste it.With every bottle and every sip you will get to know us somewhat better. Even though wines are the focus of our work, hands and wits are also needed to grow and mature them.
We are the Michel family: Karen, Ulrich, and four children. For 8 generations the wine-growing estate, which was founded in the year 1173 by the Cistercian monastery at Otterberg, affiliated monastery of the famous Eberbach Monastery, has been run by the Michel family. The monks left, the wine has persisted. Since 1645, the wine-growing estate has been managed by our ancestors and in 1780 it became our property. What has also remained is the German Fingerspitzengefühl, namely our family sense of history, paired with a pioneering spirit which is mainspring of our work.
Ulrich Michel
My studies of oenology at Geisenheim as well as several months in New Zealand and South-Africa strengthened my belief: It’s indeed the vineyard site that matters. I’ve got an intimate knowledge of our vineyard sites here in the Wonnegau area, I’m conscious of their strengths, and I know how they want to be treated. Even if nature is consistently taking us by surprise and challenging us: we make an unbeatable team. And that is also true for the whole Michel family.
Karen Michel
‘From far up North to Rheinhessen – why are you doing that?‘, they’ve asked me many times and I’ve answered with love and passion. For my husband, my children, the vineyard sites, for nature. After having completed my studies of Agricultural Science, the terroir in Heßloch is setting the tone today. And of course our offspring.
Others call it authenticity, we call it life
As the native soil is the foundation of our work, we are closely attached to nature and our earth. Conditions in the vineyard sites are never the same, neither are we. Dynamics come natural.
The C-Crew
Silke Fruth
With S in front as in sympathetic, super-organized, stable. Central pillar in the office; also contact person for our customers and walking encyclopedia.
With additional training as a culture and wine ambassador, she is always on duty for wine, sometimes also as a carnival singer “Lucrezia von Weinolsem”, but then with L in front.
Isabel Feth
With I in front, so always charming (in customer service and in making customer wishes possible), in the commitment to us, our customers and from the heart for her family, infected by the four-legged gene (“Life without a pug is possible, but pointless!”).
Whenever possible, she is the wine tasting queen.
Ilona Balzhäuser
With I in front (like so many of us): interested (in the wishes that our customers send us by phone and e-mail), working with her sister (and her own catering service), internally connected (the last name, wasn’t it? That’s right, Lucas’ mother).
Helga Schnabel
With H in front: namely with heart, with hand, with help. Our longest-serving employee brings us through the daily routine with experience and calm, grabs us by the collar now and then or reminds us to be careful.
As a Vinissima member and with her own winery, she knows how things work – and feels like our “big sister”.
Ingrid Karius
With I in front, meaning: inspiration, intuition, identification. Our face in the front line, our trade fair queen, incredible networker. Her flair for good external presentation fascinates us, her commitment to and with customers inspires us.
Sales talent and Vinissima member.
Michael Erbeldinger
With M in front, for example, for master (definitely in grapevine cutting; unfortunately not in soccer, although his reputation as a former uncompromising front runner still precedes him), doer, motivator.
His valuable professional experience always moves us forward, his dry humor makes us laugh.
Lukas Andre
With an L in front – like legendary (his dry humor), passionate (a vintner out of shot and grain, as the saying goes), loden green (because he is a committed hunter). An internship with us did not deter him, on the contrary.
A rock in the surf, on which we can always build.
Benjamin Serban
With B in front and thus representative of our best: all the good spirits from Eastern Europe who support us throughout the wine year.
Benjamin has been coming to us with his wife and other relatives for many years now, and even a pandemic doesn’t stop him from helping out in the vineyard and cellar.
Lukas Balzhäuser
With L in front for Lucky (his nickname, whether that also stands for bull’s eye of the passionate hunter? We’ll have to ask), laughing (he’s a real cheerful guy), a change of air (he spent two months in South Africa in 2020, precisely at the winery where Ulrich gained his experience abroad 20 years earlier).
Gerhold Kranz
With G in front as in boundless good humor – every morning he comes tirelessly whistling to the farm with a funny little song on his lips. He is also an enthusiastic dancer, a passionate singer and has rhythm in his blood, especially his biorhythm. He has been infected by us and is also converting his winery to organic farming as a sideline.
He works exclusively in the vineyards: he feels most at home in nature and whistles with the birds.
Armin Höhn
With A in front like Alleskönner, Alleskenner, Allesinordnungbringer. As a gifted craftsman and multi-talent personified, he is at our side with help and advice – and has been for so long that he already helped out at Ulrich’s parents’ house when he was a teenager.
In the “C-Crew” he is secretly and reverently called “Arminsolution”
Jutta Jochem
With a double J in front like JA and JUHU: We are so happy that our house fairy Jutta is now swinging the scepter (or the wooden spoon, the flour bag and more) backstage with us. For 20 years she managed her own catering business until her friend Isabel Feth brought her to us. Thanks in part to her experience in the Mensa, she keeps us on our toes and provides us with heart and a knack for daily hullabaloo as a trained home economics master, excellent cook, ambitious bread baker and potential horse thief.