Not many women can remember the first dress they bought. Marlies Dumbsky does. It was the dirndl that she wore as the Volkach wine princess. Little by little, more and more clothes were hanging in the closet, because in 2008 she first became Franconian and later German wine queen. “I wasn’t a princess at all,” she says with a laugh. “As a child I was very wild, very boyish and played with cars.” So the office of wine queen was not a childhood dream. The dream of the princess is also the wrong approach. “You do it for the wine, the winemaker and yourself,” is how the now 35-year-old sums up her experiences. She actually doesn’t like being the center of attention either. But as a wine princess, the winemaker noticed that it was easy for her to stand on stage. “The office as wine queen was then only a logical step,” says Dumbsky.
Freedom in New York
As a result of this step, the woman from Volkacher promoted German wine all over the world. She was often out alone. She received an email from the winegrowing association with flight details and hotel, and then off we went. “That was exciting,” she says, listing her goals: Japan, Sweden, India, Denmark, Finland, Venezuela, China and New York. “I was 22 and I walk through New York by myself. That was crazy. An unbelievable feeling of freedom.”
Dumbsky had a rather queasy feeling in Venezuela. The pilot ?? back then you could still go into the cockpit ?? advised her to hide her steel blue eyes behind sunglasses and to be very careful. Just don’t wear jewelry or anything valuable. She was particularly afraid of the crown. That’s why she didn’t carry it in her suitcase on the return flight, but in her hand luggage. Then the shock: your pocket is searched and the crown is discovered. “I was convinced that she was gone now,” says Dumbsky. The inspector looked at the crown and asked what it was. “Then I told him that I was a carnival princess. Thank goodness I was allowed to get on the plane with Krone.”
Often Dumbsky did not wear the crown at all during her appearances. “I wasn’t a queen, I was a PR woman,” she explains. The wine queen must be a specialist, otherwise she will not be taken seriously. “I was happy that I was a trained winemaker,” she says. So she was able to talk to winegrowers and journalists on an equal footing. “The office is incredibly demanding, but I’ve also learned so much,” she explains in retrospect.
She likes to remember appointments with journalists and visits to winegrowers. “I had such great tastings and tastings,” she says. The royal motorcycle tour on the Moselle, Rhine and Middle Rhine was also great. “That was something special,” says the passionate motorcyclist. She also met one or the other celebrity, but: “I’m not a celebrity hunter.” It was important to her to promote German and especially Franconian wine. “As an advertising person, I brought Franconia into the media, also internationally,” she says, a little proud.
Did she get the hype about her person ?? “As a wine queen you are something special for the winemakers” ?? too much, she went into the vineyards. “That’s when I came down and was grounded,” says Dumbsky, who still helps her parents on the winery today. She has been a member of the Volkach City Council for the Greens since last year. She actually didn’t want anything to do with politics. But she came to politics through her studies in media and communication studies and above all through her master’s thesis “Lobbying in Agriculture”.
Dumbsky works as a press officer for Ludwig Hartmann, the parliamentary group leader of Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen in the Bavarian state parliament. Because she wanted to help the Greens in Volkach, she decided to run. “I don’t think I was elected because I was once a wine queen,” she says. “The name Dumbsky is known in Volkach.” And if she did, she wouldn’t care, because her advice to future wine queens: “Don’t worry about what the others say”.
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