(Claude Auguste / Photo: Messe Düsseldorf / animated pic: runwayml)
There is a strange reflex in the world of wine: as soon as something comes under pressure, people begin rehearsing its requiem. This applies to grape varieties, to regions – and now also to trade fairs. For some time now, I have repeatedly heard this tone when the name ProWein comes up. Too expensive. Too German. Too empty in some halls. Too little glamour compared with Paris. All of that is probably true. And yet next Monday I will board a plane that will take me from Verona to Düsseldorf.
Not because I believe that the future of wine will be decided there. But because ProWein is precisely now a place where one should show up.
I am a lawyer, not a romantic. But I have met enough winegrowers in my life and drunk more than enough wines to know: winegrowing is not a business like any other. It is a profession with memory. With generations. With vines that live longer than their owners.
And that is precisely why wine fairs are not merely markets. They are gatherings of a profession, which must reassure itself that it still exists.
ProWein was once a triumph of the European wine world. In the 1990s, as the wine boom gathered pace, winegrowers from every region flocked to Düsseldorf. Traders from America, sommeliers from Tokyo, journalists from London – they all met there among tasting glasses and spittoons, as if it were the Davos of wine.
Today the mood is different. Wine is under pressure, morally as well as economically. The world is drinking more cautiously; some are no longer drinking at all. At the same time, competition is becoming tougher, markets more complicated, logistics more expensive. And suddenly a trade fair like Düsseldorf no longer seems like a given, but like an institution that has to justify itself.
I understand this scepticism. But I also consider it short-sighted. For wine is a cultural practice. And cultures rarely disappear because they are bad – they disappear when their representatives stop believing in them. That is why I am flying to Düsseldorf. Not to see every hall. Not to pour myself 500 Rieslings. But to do what one should do in times of crisis: Show up.
It is a strange paradox in our industry. Winegrowers like to talk about community, tradition and origin. But as soon as a trade fair begins to falter, many suddenly calculate like investment bankers: Where do I get the better return on investment? Where is the bigger stage? Where is the nicer restaurant district? That may be economically sensible. Yet wine has never been only about economics. ProWein may no longer be the most glamorous place in the industry. But it is still a meeting place for the European wine world. A place where German, Austrian, French, Italian and Spanish winegrowers do not merely sell themselves, but also meet one another.
I know young winegrowers from South Tyrol, the Wachau and the Jura who met there for the first time. I have listened to importers from Canada who suddenly discovered a small winery from Burgenland (Gut Oggau). And I have seen two old winegrowers from the Moselle and the Rhône discussing a Franconian Silvaner as if it were a question of world philosophy – which, of course, it was!
Such things do not happen on the internet. They happen where people look one another in the eye, raise a glass and say: Try this.
Perhaps, no, certainly, that is precisely why I am flying despite all my doubts. Because an industry that is currently discussing its future needs places where it can meet in person. Paris may be more beautiful. The food better. The hotels cheaper. But Düsseldorf is – at least for a few days in March – still a place where one can see whether European wine is still standing together.
And if I am honest: In times like these, you do not only go to the winners. You are human. A wine drinker. And in solidarity!