Future of the German Gault&Millau unclear

MUNICH. The future of the German edition of Gault&Millau is once again uncertain. The previous licence holder, the publisher Henris Edition, has announced that it is "rethinking" its role after four years. It is not clear from the publication whether the licence still exists at present. The URL gaultmillau-media.com is redirected directly to the publisher's website, while calling up the URL gaultmillau.de has shown "in maintenance" for months. An enquiry to the licensor regarding the status of the German licence has so far remained unanswered.

Henris is apparently now dispensing with its own tests and sees itself as an "objective and comprehensive platform" that combines reviews from renowned sources such as Michelin, Gault&Millau, Feinschmecker and Gambero Rosso in one aggregate. This is to be supplemented by so-called "community reviews". The reviews taken into account are then summarised into a score, which is expressed by diamonds. The new app is due to go online shortly. So far, recommendations have been made in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Italy. New content for France, Spain and Croatia will follow in the coming weeks. The preparation of the ratings is thus similar to that offered by Restaurant-Ranglisten.de, where all ratings from professional restaurant guides worldwide can be researched for a restaurant.

In 2024, a legal dispute arose between Henris Edition as the licence holder and the French licensor of Gault&Millau. In Germany, the attempt to terminate the licence failed. Gault&Millau had terminated Henris' licence with effect from 16 November 2023. Henris did not accept this. Gault&Millau therefore took legal action, but the licensor did not receive the desired temporary injunction. In January 2024, according to its spokesperson, the Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court essentially justified its decision by stating that Gault&Millau had not sufficiently explained the grounds for cancellation and made them credible. In any case, an extraordinary termination without notice was late with regard to the alleged breaches of contract, as the applicant had been aware of the alleged breaches of contract for months according to its own submission. At the time, Henris had stated that it had paid the licence fees until the end of 2025. Breaches of duty, such as alleged deviations from the ranking system or graphic specifications, had not been ascertainable. Since 2022, the German Gault&Millau has used a different rating system to that used internationally by Gault&Millau. Instead of the combination of points and the resulting toques, in Germany there are up to five red or black toques and therefore ten grades. Internationally, Gault&Millau uses a system with 20 points as the maximum score.