New tenants for the Walchensee village shop

Created: 08/03/2022, 11:00 am

By: Franziska Seliger

The new operators of the village shop in Walchensee: The siblings Sabine and Michael Gistl.

Shop stays private in the family ©

The village shop in Walchensee has new tenants.

Sabine and Michael Gistl will "gradually" reopen the local supplier market, which is so important for locals and holidaymakers, next Thursday, August 4th.

Walchensee –

After it became known in spring that the previous tenants would no longer operate the village shop in Walchensee, there was great concern that the people in Walchensee would soon no longer have a place to go to buy bread, butter or milk.

However, the owner of the house, master baker Anton Lugauer from Benediktbeuern, had already announced at the end of April that he was holding intensive talks with potential buyers and assured: "The village shop will not be closed" (we reported).

Now the talks have come to a successful end.

The new tenants of the village shop are called Sabine and Michael Gistl.

Most recently, the last conversion and renovation work was still being carried out in the building.

The store is scheduled to reopen on Thursday, August 4 – initially Monday to Saturday from seven to ten a.m.

Shop stays in the family

The fact that the siblings will continue to run the business is not entirely coincidental.

“My grandmother Krscence Lugauer comes from Benediktbeuern.

She was sent to Walchensee at the age of 16 to take over the bakery branch of the family business in Benediktbeuern,” says 51-year-old Sabine Gistl.

According to Gistl, she and her brother Michael took over their parents' house in Walchensee in 2015.

Anton Lugauer, the owner of the village shop, is her great cousin.

When it became known that the previous tenants were leaving, he asked them if they wanted to take over the business.

And after some thought, Sabine Gistl realized: she wanted to.

As a former restaurant operator, she has experience in gastronomy.

Since training as a sommelier, she now works as a lecturer at the IHK in Munich and runs her own advertising agency at the same time.

Her brother Michael works as an orthopedist with his own practice in Gilching.

She and her brother have given serious thought to the future concept of the village shop.

"We don't want to have certain things in the store," Gistl clarifies - for example products from large corporations.

Food and products in the village shop should be of high quality and, as far as possible, come from a sustainable and well-known source, says Gistl.

The siblings will get their bread and baked goods from the Lugauer Bakery, as they have done up to now.

Meat and sausage products are delivered from a farm in the Rheingau.

Eggs and milk products come from a direct marketer from Bad Bayersoien.

The Gistls want to get their wines from an ecological winery in Burgenland, while fruit and vegetables could be delivered from the monastery in Schlehdorf.

In the future, high-quality groceries should be available in the Walchensee village shop, not cheap goods.

"Of course, a regional bottle of milk costs more," says Gistl.

"But it's also better for that." With her village shop, she wants to help change consumer behavior among Germans.

Away from cheap towards valuable.

"We just have to rethink," she says.

No supermarket but shop with regional products

After the opening, the range will be adjusted and expanded "gradually".

"But we will not become a supermarket in the traditional sense," emphasizes Gistl.

"Perhaps you can say: 'You may not necessarily get what you are looking for from us.

But you get everything you need to enjoy a nice meal.'” Both she and her brother will continue in their previous roles in advertising agency and practice.

Neither of them would therefore have to live on the income from the village shop.

"It's enough for us if it carries itself." So far they have had one employee to support them.

Other interested parties are welcome (contact for interested parties: dorfladen@semmelbergerl.de).

You can find more current news from the region around Bad Tölz at Merkur.de/Bad Tölz.