Brillat-Savarin Medal for Hermann Bareiss

BAIERSBRONN. Hotelier Hermann Bareiss has been awarded the Brillat-Savarin Plaque. The award ceremony took place last Wednesday during a formal event at the resort in Baiersbronn. For almost 70 years, the prestigious Brillat-Savarin Foundation has been presenting this award to figures from the catering and hospitality industries “for their achievements, innovative spirit and commitment to sustainability”.

It brought the guests to their feet: “We hoteliers and restaurateurs provide people with a roof over their heads and invite them to sit down at our table. The fact that this comes at a cost has nothing to do with why we do it: Hospitality is a profoundly human gesture of openness to the world and to people, of welcome, of caring for one another and of living together”. Following his statement as a host and hotelier, the standing ovations for Hermann Bareiss showed no sign of ending.

After Hannes Bareiss and his wife Britta had welcomed the more than 100 guests, Konrad Pötzel, Chairman of the Foundation Board, addressed the new award winner: “Today we are honouring not just an extraordinary life’s work. We are honouring an attitude, a way of relating to people. The conviction that hospitality is more than just service – namely, an expression of respect, warmth and genuine interest in people.”

The ‘reason for the award’, as the laudatory speech put it, is self-evident from the resort itself, which is regarded as one of the ‘most extraordinary and remarkable hotels in the world’. Created by a hotelier who, throughout his entire entrepreneurial life, has “made the impossible possible: Hermann Bareiss is no one who merely treads the line. He is, against all odds, a boundary-breaker. Only in this way could a world-class resort with the aspiration for – and achievement of – total excellence come into being.”

However, the keynote speech did not focus on the obvious achievements and successes of the “doyen of hospitality in Germany, a legend and icon not only amongst German hoteliers, a man of charisma and character”. Instead, it centred on the importance of humanity in Bareiss’s work and influence. To his colleagues, Bareiss is regarded by the speaker as a “communication genius” who, through the industry gathering “Mitteltaler Tafelrunde”, succeeded in creating a “spirit of togetherness”. For the next generation – for whom he initiated a training reform through the FHG (Association for the Promotion of the Hotel and Catering Industry) – “he helps them discover the value and joy of serving guests, which is at the same time a way of nurturing their own, perhaps hidden, talent: to be open to people and there for them.”

“Can you come to terms with the expression ‘love of humanity’?” asked the speaker, as the discussion turned to the guests: “With its excellence and luxury, the Bareiss does not celebrate itself; it celebrates every single guest in a way that reflects their unique individuality: here I am myself; here I can be myself.”

The guests – including Freiburg’s pioneering hotelier Roland Burtsche (Colombi Hotel), Ingo C. Peters from Hamburg’s legendary ‘Vier Jahreszeiten’, Caroline von Kretschmann from Heidelberg’s grand ‘Europäischer Hof’ – during the festive dinner that followed. Under the guidance of chefs Claus-Peter Lumpp, Oliver Ruthardt, Oliver Steffensky and Daniel Sorge, the kitchen demonstrated what it means for the love for the guest to ‘go through the stomach’ and why the hotel has repeatedly been “Culinary Luxury Hotel of the Year”. And the service, under the direction of catering director Dieter Kalweit, confirmed the words of the laudator: “At the Bareiss, guests feel the cosy warmth of the hotel and the warmth of its hosts’ hearts.”

There were then standing ovations for the Bareiss team from the kitchen and front-of-house. The guests experienced first-hand what this means: “Hermann Bareiss has the ability to inspire in others a passion that goes beyond mere professionalism: to have someone as a guest means ensuring their happiness.” Hermann Bareiss himself was also among the guests. It was plain to see that making him happy on this day had been a real success.