Our winery

The Gross winery is located on the Ratscher Nussberg, which is among Südsteiermark’s most celebrated viticultural sites. The wines of the family are among the best in the region, year after year.

The Gross family has been growing wine since 1907. Today, Martina and Johannes Gross pursue their craft in the charming hillscape of Südsteiermark and adjacent Štajerska Slovenija. Their reputed sites (or Rieden), such as Nussberg, Perz or Sulz, are characterised by extreme slopes. The vineyards are cultivated in a sustainable and quality-assuring approach, the use of machinery being hardly possible. In this area, the cool winds from the Alps meet with the warm air masses of the Adriatic Sea. The grapes become fully ripe in this Alpine-Mediterranean climate, and due to diurnal temperature variations of up to 20°C, they possess both freshness and aroma. The soils are highly diverse: depending on the vineyard site, sand and gravel, shell limestone, marl, or soils of Volcanic origin mark the unmistakeable character of the wines.

Our region-specific portfolio includes white varieties such as Pinot Blanc, Muscat Blanc à Petits Grains, Sauvignon Blanc, or the Slovenian Furmint. Vinification is entirely focused on the origin of the wines, which is characterised by both the climate and soil.

In order to make room for their special features to unfold, we vinify even very small vineyard blocks in separated vats. Weingut Gross has always made a point of giving their wines all the time they need to mature. Even bottled wines often remain in the winery for years before leaving the cellar. Visitors may marvel at the rarities kept at the heart of our cellar and wine lovers try them in a tasting.

Visitors will encounter three generations. Members of our family will tell you more about our wines, whether in the cellar or on the panorama terrace, and show you around the winery and vineyards. In spring and fall, we will also spoil you with home-made specialties.

History

A family on the Nussberg and a glimpse of the history of the winegrowing family.

The course was first set by ancestor Heinrich Gross. He bought the vineyard on Witscheiner Herrenberg in 1907, thus paving the way for the winegrowing business to be. It would take five generations and over a century before the family came to specialize on wine alone. A huge step was taken by Alois Gross, who starting in the early 1980s focused on excellency in wines, with the help of Ulrike. The Gross family was soon to harvest the fruits of their work: wines made by Gross came to be listed in award-winning restaurants, and in 1991 the Falstaff magazine elected Alois as “winemaker of the year”. As a founding member of “Steirische Klassik” wineries (now STK), Alois and his colleagues built up the reputation of Styrian wine both at home and abroad. The name Gross acquired a firm place among the top-rated wineries in Austria. In 2006, Ulrike and Alois Gross devolved responsibility to their sons Johannes and Michael. The brothers took over the parental business at the age of only 21 and 19 respectively, following in the footsteps of their ancestors

Their parents knew from their own experience how important it was to make important decisions in the younger years of life. With great care and step by step, the brothers developed together with their wives Maria and Martina the traditional winery further by giving it a new orientation. Together, they were heading for an even more successful future: Weingut Gross has opened itself up to the wine-growing region of Štajerska Slovenija, with soil and climate conditions hardly different from their Styrian home ground. In 2018, Maria and Michael withdrew from the winery in southern Styria to focus fully on Vino Gross. Martina and Johannes Gross have been running the Gross Winery in southern Styria ever since. The two winemaker brothers married two sisters. The four of them continued to work together under the label Gross & Gross - Geschwister und der Wein.

The winery team

Visit the winery

Hospitality is at the heart of our success …

The gates of our winery are wide open. Wine lovers may visit our vineyards and cellar, taste our wines, and buy them at ex-winery prices. We are looking forward to your visit here at the Nussberg!

Tasting at the winery
You may walk into our winery for a tasting at any time during opening hours. Our family or a knowledgeable member of our team will be happy to welcome you here and help you pick your choice of wines that you may also purchase on site.

> No appointment needed. For groups of eight persons or more we kindly ask you to inform us beforehand.

Guided winery tour and tasting
Why not learn more about the various aspects of our winery? The tour includes a glimpse of the winery premises and the cellar. We will be happy to tell you more about our approach to the work in the vineyards and cellar. This will be followed by a tasting a selection of our wines to meet your personal preferences.

> 20 euros per person sharing (groups of 8 up to max. 12 persons) including a taste of 8 wines.
> By appointment only, please dial +43 3453 2527 or e-mail us at weingut@gross.at

“Wine and more” on our terrace
Spring and fall is the time when we open our terrace for you to enjoy the wonderful views across the hillscape, well into Slovenia. Martina Gross will spoil you with her home-made Styrian specialties, such as some traditional meat in the pot, home-made spreads, smoked pork sausages, and more. Enjoy our wines by the glass or by the bottle.
- May and June: Fr & Sat, 10 am – 6 pm
- September and October: Fr & Sat, 10 am – 6 pm

Partners

It is easier to make headway together than alone. The TFA and STK wineries share a common goal, and a long-standing friendship across generations.

(Johannes, Alois and Martina Gross)

Together!

STK - www.stk-wein.at/en

Steep hills - Ten characters - Keen wine
The Gross winery is member of the group “Steirische Terroir- und Klassikweingüter”, a free association of wineries highly committed to region-specific viticulture.

The STK wineries: Gross, Lackner-Tinnacher, Neumeister, Wolfgang Maitz, Polz, Erwin Sabathi, Hannes Sabathi, Sattlerhof, Tement und Winkler-Hermaden.

TFA - www.tu-felix-austria.de

Tu Felix Austria
“Tu Felix Austria” is the shared motto of nine outstanding Austrian winegrowers in their goal to promote the sales of Austrian wine in nearby Germany.

The TFA wineries: Paul Achs, Fidesser, Gesellmann, Gross, Gerhard Markowitsch, Rudi Pichler, Salomon-Undhof, Robert Schlumberger und Wieninger

From our wine archives

In our archives, we store excellent wines under ideal conditions. We give them plenty of time to mature and release them for sale at just the right moment.

In a prominent location and presenting themselves to the visitor’s eye are our wine archives. Here, single-vineyard wines from our best sites and precious rarities from the last 40 years have yet to escape the bottle opener. Alois Gross has always been keen on tasting his own wines after several years of age. His sons Johannes and Michael put some noble drops aside every year to fill their archives with bottle formats up to Balthazar (12 litres) and Nebuchadnezzar (15 litres). Each wine is given its own place of honour here to unfold its full potential.

From time to time, we draw some perfectly stored wines from our archives and offer them to connoisseurs. If you don’t have the possibility to store wines for years until their full maturity, we can help you to have this tasty experience. Just ask for our seasonal letter or newsletter to be among the first to know when we release certain wines from our archives for sale in a limited number of bottles.

Newsletter registration

WINES

from our single-vineyard sites

Looking for rare wines from our archives to store in your own wine cellar?