Swabian care meets French esprit
Winery Zimmerle, Rems valley, Germany
The Zimmerle winery is located in Korb in the Rems Valley in South Germany. The family has been involved in viticulture since 1647, but it was not until 1979, when Friedrich Zimmerle took over a restaurant, that he also began to make his own wine instead of giving the grapes to the cooperative. After eight years of training in Württemberg and Bordeaux, Zimmerle's son Jens joined the business in 2008 and took over the winery in 2014. Over the last 15 years, the winery has doubled in size.
The new winery has just been completed. The outdoor facilities are not yet finished and the barrels have not all been moved from the old winery, but the new grapes are already being processed here and you can see the clear plan according to which the winery was designed.
Everyone has their own philosophy, says Zimmerle. His motto is "Swabian care meets French esprit". But it also takes patience and staying power, and at some point it pays off. Zimmerle's strategy has been the same for 15 years, he says, it just took him a while to get to where he wanted to be. The success proves him right.
In 2022, his AGE was voted Germany's best red wine cuvée by Eichelmann. And at the latest since Jens Zimmerle was named Winemaker of the Year in Württemberg by the trade magazine Vinum in 2022, the Zimmerle winery has been the talk of the town.
Zimmerle wants to make classics. Chasing after short-lived trends is not his thing. Winning the many awards in recent years at the latest has shown that he is well on his way.
This was also true for the conversion to organic viticulture. At first, only costs were incurred and no more bottles were sold as a result. Also the vineyard did not look so nice any more. And when weak vintages come along, "you start to doubt yourself," Zimmerle admits. But it was the right decision.
In the meantime, cultivation has also been changed. The grape remains are composted and mixed with horse manure. This natural fertiliser is then returned to the vineyard, in other words, a true circular economy.
Zimmerle is happy about all the space in the new winery. He likes to have everything on one level because that makes the processes easier, especially with all the manual work Zimmerle does. He also prefers to have many small tanks rather than several large ones, simply because he is more flexible that way. Viticulture changes every 20 years, Zimmerle states. That is why he designed the new building so that it is not static, so that it can easily be moved and expanded. If the winery continues to be so successful, that will soon be the case anyway. Zimmerle praises the quality of the containers and draws comparisons to his way of working. "I learned in top companies, I can only do quality," Zimmerle says. "Maybe that's also why I ended up at Speidel."
