Founders & Investors
Marcel Schmidlin: Already at the age of 22 years, I was introduced to the art of wine making and tasting by a friend and met Gazzola, one of the pioneers for Italian wine import to Basel and began taking particular interest in Italian wines. Later, as managing director of Creditreform Basel, I introduced and organized wine tasting tours to Italy that became important corporate event. From then on, I was involved in wine importing, travelling and tasting alongside my job.
Thus, shortly after my 40th birthday, the idea matured in me to be able to run a winery in Piedmont one day, in order to be able to experience the diversity of the profession of a winegrower myself in a further stage of my life. At 55, the dream became true. After two viticulture and vineyard courses, I was ready for the task and, together with my wife Helga, we decided to give up my job as director of Creditreform in order to realise our lifelong dream.
Crowdfunding: It is worth mentioning here that around 50 friends and former business partners and ex-employees believed in my success and were prepared to “invest” CHF 2,000. This enabled me to immediately invest the resources in building up the vineyard and the cantina. A huge thank you to all of them! And fortunately, everyone has already been able to benefit from the “payback” in the form of my first successful wines and, of course, a visit to the Farm to unwind. The crowdfunding has been completed in the meantime.
Helga Kuhnert Schmidlin, Jasmin & Leyla: Helga, my life partner, was initially sceptical about the idea. But the entire family knew that important decisions once made would be implemented thoughtfully and consequently. That’s why I was able to count on great support from the family right from the beginning. Starting with the selection of the winery, the planning of the renovation, the equipment, and the active help in the vineyard.
A special thanks goes to Benjamin, the partner of my daughter Jasmin, who both came to visit. Benjamin, an architect and engineer, helped me enormously with the initial implementation of the building plans and drew them. In addition, all the VINCELLO wine labels were hand-drawn by him. Many thanks!
Rainer Füeg: Shortly afterwards, my long-time friend and companion of many decades, Rainer Füeg, came forward. Knowing that finances were tight, he offered me financial support and became a partner in VINCELLO s.s.a., with a 10% share in the company. In the last two years he has also actively helped – hopefully for many more years to come!
Hugo Dubacher: Another good friend of mine was interested in my project from the very beginning and so we assessed the first 12 wineries together and he finally supported me in my decision “Annunziata”. Since then, he has been a regular companion and fellow campaigner in the cantina as well as in the vineyard. He also decided to invest and financed the adjoining building, which houses the wine store on the lower level, the mechanical workshop on the ground floor and his own flat on the first floor. This allowed me to complete the Piedmont winery in one go rather than in stages.
This means that the company is complete and versatilely secured! Here are the faces behind the company:
THE PIEDMONTESE COUNTRY HOUSE & WINE ESTATE «VINCELLO»
The estate belongs to the political commune 14055 Costigliole d’Asti, in the fraction “Annunziata”, about 2.5 km from the town, on a beautiful hill with a wonderful view of the surroundings, the town with its castle and of other wineries. There is a fantastic view stretching from the Apennines (French-Italian Alps) to the Swiss Alps.
The typical Piedmontese country house from 1910 is almost 30 metres long and 6.5 metres wide. It includes the former stable (today wine magazine, mechanical workshop, Hugo’s flat) as well as a converted garage, which has been turned into our staff’s flat and a bar with toilet and shower adjacent to the pool. The property, including the historic and modern wine cellar, is powered by a 9.96 KW photovoltaic system. Furthermore, the estate has a 30 cubic metres cistern (30’000 litres rainwater) as well as its own well with ground water. The entire system is built to be sustainable!
The property was completely renovated and rebuilt from May 2019 to August 2021 according to our own plans. The ground floor comprises my own flat with office/guest reception and technical room as well as a large breakfast room with adjoining guest kitchen, which leads onto the approximately 40 square metres terrace. This serves as a breakfast and aperitif area and is also used for tastings.
The 600 square metres newly landscaped garden with the two mighty shady conifers includes a saltwater pool (9 x 4 metres) including a bar with changing room, toilet and shower. A bocce court is also planned for 2022/2023.
