Profile: Reh Kendermann Winery

Profile: Reh Kendermann Winery

With enthusiasm and a passion for good wines, Carl Reh founded a trading company on the Moselle for grapes, must and wine in 1920. A few years later, he built his first large winery there. Innovative and always intent on achieving the best quality, the company grew to become one of the largest wineries in Germany. The merging of the wineries Carl Reh, Leiwen, and Hermann Kendermann, Bingen, made the Reh Kendermann GmbH Winery one of Germany’s leading wine exporters.

The winery is now in its third generation of family ownership under Andrea and Carl Reh. Carl Reh is committed to the values held by his grandfather: producing and selling top-quality wine.

Reh Kendermann is one of the most modern wineries in Germany and is a leader in the design and production of brand-name wines and premium own-label products. It was the first winery to use temperature-controlled fermentation. The company is also the largest exporter of brand-name wines from Germany. These include Black Tower, the most successful German wine brand, which currently sells around 14 million bottles worldwide. In the German grocery retail segment, Reh Kendermann sells the exclusive brand Espiritu de Chile and the internationally successful Lindeman’s wines from Australia. Since 2017, wines and sparkling wines from the Italian brand CANTI have been added to the range. At the end of 2015, Reh Kendermann became majority shareholder of YAPP Brothers, a British premium retailer of primarily French wines. In the 2016/2017 financial year (1 July 2016–30 June 2017), Reh Kendermann earned revenue of 75 million euros. The headquarters of the Reh Kendermann GmbH Winery, housing the management, marketing, sales, administration, winery, bottling and wine warehouse, is in Bingen, with other sites in Leiwen, Gau-Bickelheim and Böchingen. At the Oprisor site in south-western Romania, 252 hectares of vineyard are in production. Reh Kendermann GmbH also took over the South African winery Napier Vineyards in April 2017. High-quality manufactured wines, including the Bordeaux blend “Red Medallion”, are produced on around 90 hectares of vineyard in Wellington and Paarl. Global sales are handled from Bingen.

Reh Kendermann at a glance:
Managing Directors                              Carl Reh, Alexander Rittlinger
Sales FY 2016/2017                                75 million euros
Employees worldwide                           280
Employees in Germany                         120
Of whom apprentices/students           8

(Industrial clerk, wholesale and international trade specialist (specialising in foreign trade), wine technician, computer scientist (specialising in systems integration), dual studies in business administration for industry)