We, the Lauffener Weingärtner, are a multi-award-winning Württemberg winegrowers’ cooperative with around 1,100 members, who, as a “multi-family operation,” cultivate a vineyard area of approximately 890 hectares, including 120 hectares of terraced steep slopes.
Thanks to the great commitment of our winemakers and the ambition to harvest excellent grapes, we not only succeed in producing high-quality wines, but also in preserving our unique cultural landscape in the Neckar Valley around Lauffen and Mundelsheim through intensive work in the vineyards, especially in the steep slopes.
The land around Lauffen am Neckar has always been fertile and has been used for various agricultural purposes. Numerous crops such as potatoes, grains, as well as fruits and berries grow on the nutrient-rich alluvial soils of the Neckar. The friendly warm climate also enables viticulture, which can be traced back to the time of the Romans. Like no other element, wine has shaped the cultural landscape of Lauffen am Neckar, especially in the terraced steep slopes of the Neckar.
This outstanding importance of wine for Lauffen should be unmistakably captured by a symbol. Thus, in 1980, on the initiative of Ulrich Maile, the current honorary member of the board of directors of the Lauffener Weingärtner eG, the commission was given to Mr. Professor Prudi of the Stuttgart Academy of Fine Arts to symbolically unite Lauffen with art, wine, and science.
Two years later, a model for a wrought iron artwork was presented to the Lauffener Weingärtner, which, in reference to the Exodus story of the Jewish people in the Old Testament, depicts the grape bearers Joshua & Caleb. They were sent by Moses along with ten other spies into the desert to find the land where “milk and honey” flow. As proof, the scouts were to bring back fruits. Joshua & Caleb, as a sign of the fertility of the promised land, jointly carried a huge grape on a branch, too large to be carried alone.
The recognition in this symbol was clear: Lauffen as a fertile land and the grape bearers Joshua & Caleb as representatives of the community of Lauffener Weingärtner. Shortly thereafter, the artwork was forged by the blacksmith Allmendinger in Vaihingen/Enz and has since found its place amidst the Lauffener vineyards, where it serves as a weather vane indicating the direction of the wind.
On average, we produce approximately 11.0 million kg per harvest year. Of this, we market 60% of our wine within Baden-Württemberg and 40% outside Baden-Württemberg.
Lauffen am Neckar is located in Baden-Württemberg, in the middle of the Neckar Valley between Heilbronn and Stuttgart.
1935 – (Lauffener Weingärtner eG)
1903 – (WG Mundelsheim eG)
(Merger of both cooperatives in 2012)
International Featured Standard (IFS), ECOVIN/BIO-Baden-Württemberg (for our organic wine range).