Kolonne Null: de-alcoholized wine from premium wineries

It’s summer time. We’re hanging around in the sun. Now a cool glass of wine with friends would be fine – but stop, I still have to drive. What a bummer! Also, Anne in the round has to grab a glass of water instead, because she is pregnant. And Ahmed doesn’t drink alcohol for religious reasons either. All of us know at least one of these situations. And if not, many groups of people are still affected by this exclusion. A non-alcoholic wine alternative, you say? Whoa, no, just a Coke, please. But this is kind of not the same…

Philipp and Moritz, the founder of Kolonne Null, shared exactly this thought and wanted to fight it – which they have done very well, as we found out. Non-alcoholic wines are known so far for being not very tasty, very sugary and unsatisfactory in terms of quality. But Kolonne Null steps in and produces de-alcoholized wine from premium wineries for a growing community and conscious drinkers.

What else is so special about the business idea of the young brand? Having curious and entrepreneurial minds, the two of Kolonne Null GmbH gained a firm understanding of the whole de-alcoholization process, from filling and over to marketing – in order to create a very unique beverage. And although their idea was met with negative feedback at first, the boys bravely dared to convince themselves of it and thus created the courage that was necessary to manufacture the product.

In five years, the brand wants to be known to produce great alcohol-free wines all over Europe and that the market gains followers of great de-alcoholized wine production, so that the customers can choose out of a big variety in the future, as they choose different wines for a different occasion – and, of course, so that the problem of bad non-alcoholic wines can finally end.

Thanks to the two, nobody has to live without the sparkling wine experience anymore.

Please introduce yourself. What does your startup do and which problems does it solve? Which solutions to existing problems does it offer?

Alcohol free beer is something most people have heard about. Alcohol-free wine is yet pretty uncommon or known to be sugary and of low quality. Kolonne Null is a young company with the goal to produce high quality premium alcohol-free wines for a growing community of conscious drinkers. No matter if you drive, are pregnant, take medication - Kolonne Null is your drink.

How did you come up with the idea and concept? What inspired and motivated you to create this product?

The founders Moritz and Philipp enjoy wine. However, the entrepreneur and the artist also like to stay fit and alert. So they longed to find a fair equilibrium and came up with this sophisticated and well tasting beverage.

What is special about your business idea and operating model?

Kolonne Null GmbH has a firm understanding on the complete supply chain of alcoholfree wine production from making wines, de-alcoholization plants to filling and marketing. Being curious and entrepreneurial it allows the company to combine knowledge from the different stakeholders to create a unique beverage. Kolonne Null GmbH only works with premium family owned wineries with distinguished high quality wines.

What were the biggest difficulties you had to overcome while building your startup?

First a lot of people told us we were weirdos for coming up with such an idea although 6% of the German beer market is already alcohol-free. Then the industry told us that using quality wines wouldn’t change a thing until we tested it ourselves. On the long product quality will be the key and our company values are to treat everybody with respect while simultaneously questioning the status quo. The same way the car industry couldn’t come up with alternatives for gasoline, the wine industry is not likely to come up with good alcoholfree wines.

Where do you see yourself and your company in 5 years?

In 5 years Kolonne Null will be known to produce great alcohol-free wines all over Europe. At the same time hopefully a lot of followers will also produce great wines allowing the customers to choose out of a big variety of products the same way you enjoy picking different kinds of wine for different occasions. We want a fair market share but have the goal to have a product that we drink and enjoy ourselves regularilly.

What are your expectations from the NX-FOOD program? What would be the best-case scenario for you?

We expect NX-Food to be a good partner, a challenger and a distributor. We love to share our knowledge with other teams and to profit from the program’s network.

Please list here your milestones and achievements you are proud of: launch in a new country, number of sold products, awards and investments etc.

• More than 25.000 produced bottles
• winner NX Food (3x)
• Edeka Foodstarter program
• 10 business angels (2 from the food industry)
• happy people that thank you for your product’s existence