Since 1995, the wines of the self-proclaimed “historic line” (“Linea Storia”) belong to the business of the Friulian winery Vini Lunardelli. The 125 labels include images of Sisi, Che Guevara and Napoleon, but also Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin.
This has caused worldwide outrage, which is why the winery’s junior boss Andrea Lunardelli wants to get the labels of the worst dictators out of reach when he takes over his father Alessandro’s business next year. Although “the most requested label in our historical series is Adolf Hitler”.
Especially with tourists from Germany, but also with many British, Nordic, French and Russian countries,” Andrea Lunardelli told the American magazine “Vice”. Indeed, of the more than 20,000 bottles sold worldwide each year, 12,000 are from the German dictator Mussolini, for example, uses only half of the bottles.
The “Der Führer” motif collection alone contains 35 stickers with pictures of Hitler as well as National Socialist officials and generals such as Göring, Hess, Himmler and Rommel. The Lunardelli family has always maintained that their “historic” wine line was never politically motivated. The bottles are much more intended for people who want to “remember history”.
received death threats
The junior boss doesn’t like the line and is fed up with the controversy over it, says Andrea Lunardelli. He even recently received death threats from Russia after Russian state television Rossiya 1 replayed a 2018 documentary about neo-Nazi movements in Italy with footage of the wines in early May. Furthermore, his partner is from Ukraine. “We no longer want to be associated with Nazism,” said the winemaker.