#OpenDoorWein - A wine tourism initiative!
Wine and tourism are a perfect combination for networking! An educational collaboration project at the Wine Campus Neustadt, funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, combines entrepreneurial spirit with research expertise.
Tourism is a key economic driver in all German wine-growing regions and makes a substantial contribution to rural development. The COVID-19 pandemic has dealt a severe blow to the tourism industry, but it also presents an opportunity to rethink tourism and design offerings that are oriented toward sustainability and forward-looking. In line with this philosophy, Sarah Janson —co-owner of a Palatinate winery—founded the #OpenDoorWein network in the midst of the crisis year 2020 to collaborate with like-minded individuals on how to boost wine tourism in the Palatinate and attract more tourists to the wineries. The goal of #OpenDoorWein is to offer structured, paid experiences centered around wine. This is intended to lower the barriers for tourists to visiting wineries. At the same time, the wineries can make a significant contribution to their business’s value creation.
In the summer semester of 2021, Sarah Janson first presented her idea during a guest lecture at the Wine Campus Neustadt. This was followed by a research project funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK), which was implemented in the 2021–22 winter semester by the team led by Prof. Dr. Laura Ehm. In keeping with this focus, wine tourism is part of the curriculum in the 6th semester of the dual degree program in Viticulture & Enology. To further support the wine tourism network in implementing the results, a teaching collaboration project was then carried out in the summer semester of 2022 in partnership with Worms University of Applied Sciences and Heilbronn University of Applied Sciences. This enabled students to work across universities on a practically relevant topic and benefit from each other’s expertise: the viticulture and wine marketing expertise of the Neustadt students was perfectly complemented by the tourism and marketing expertise of the students from Worms University of Applied Sciences and Heilbronn University of Applied Sciences.
The project began with a joint kick-off event at the Schloss Janson Winery, where the students—at the winery’s invitation—took part in a wine-tasting tour and learned a great deal about the #OpenDoorWein, the concept of “open wineries,” and the design of wine experience offerings. A joint seminar day at the Wine Campus Neustadt was used to impart basic knowledge about wine tourism in Germany’s wine regions, work intensively on the projects, and provide cross-project feedback to one another. To wrap things up, the students visited the #OpenDoorWeingut Weinwerk Reinhardt in Ruppertsberg and tried out the “Wine Flights,” which are offered to visitors to the winery as an alternative to a traditional guided wine tasting in the wine bar. After the long period of the COVID-19 pandemic, everyone enjoyed the exchange and the cozy get-together that followed.
To cover all subject areas, the student teams worked on various subprojects: The Neustadt students began by analyzing the wine tourism offerings of the participating wineries and, in collaboration with the wineries, developed an individual #OpenDoorWein concept for each to professionally design their wine experience offerings. This subproject was supervised by Prof. Ehm at the Wine Campus Neustadt. The students from Worms analyzed options for a sustainable organizational structure for the network. Another group developed a marketing and social media concept and analyzed available booking platforms that could be used to make the offerings bookable online. In addition, a “wine hopping” concept was presented. Prof. Dr. Knut Scherhag from Worms University of Applied Sciences supervised this group work as part of the course “Practical Destination Development.” The Heilbronn students focused on the question of whether and how the #OpenDoorWein initiative could also be established in other wine-growing regions outside the Palatinate. They were supervised by Prof. Dr. Ralf Vogler. The results were subsequently presented and made available to the members of #OpenDoorWein . The response was consistently positive. Many suggestions have already been put into practice or are being used as a basis for discussion to further develop the network.
The diversity of ideas and results shows that the concept of networking is worthwhile—entirely in the spirit of #OpenDoorWein.
And if you’re now interested in booking an #OpenDoorWein experience, you can find what you’re looking for right here.
The results of the research project are also available online.
Image credit “Open Door at a Winery”: Colourbox
Image credit “Portrait of Laura Ehm”: Stephan Presser Photography