Wine Tourism and Vienna’s Heurigen. Regulatory Framework and Problems

As a part of cultural tourism, gastronomic tourism reflects a region’s cultural and historical heritage. One area of gastronomic tourism that has received more scientific attention in recent years is wine tourism. Today, wine tourism is a key industry for many European countries which is growing positively. No other area of wine tourism embodies the combination of wine and cuisine as well as the gastronomy of the vineyards. Heurigen (Buschenschank), Vienna's traditional taverns, played and still play an important role in Vienna's wine and food culture, being a typical gastronomic offering of winegrowers in Austria. Unfortunately, the number of Heurigen decreased from over 500 in the 1960s to about 100 in 2020. The goal of this study presented here is to investigate the decline of Heurigen nowadays from a legal perspective. Therefore, this paper analyses the current institutional framework of wine tourism in Austria. This article lists the most important issues of the existing legal framework which relate to the operating conditions, the opening hours and the dishes that can be enjoyed in Heurigen. Additionally, some marketing policies are listed to identify the specificity of these establishments. Our results show that to avoid further reducing the number of remaining Heurigen, the government needs to amend the current institutional framework to benefit the owners. Furthermore, results show that measures and advertising policies should be taken to promote the cultural heritage of Heurigen as, unfortunately, it is a sector that is not promoted as much as it should be.