They are familiar to many in the Rhine-Main area: products and services of the Fleckenbühler, such as high-quality baked goods and cheeses from their own organic production facilities but also catering or help with moving house. Since 1984, the community has been running a farm in Cölbe near Marburg based on the Demeter association’s guidelines. People with addiction disorders are accepted here without any red tape. The aim is to live autonomously again and permanently free of addiction. Support is provided here by staff members who can appreciate the situation of those affected especially well due to their own previous addiction experiences.

In the meantime, the Fleckenbühler operate more than just an addiction support facility in addition to the farm in Cölbe as well as in Frankfurt and in Willinghausen near Alsfeld, where there is a house for young people. A total of around 200 people live and work at all three locations, while many others join the community temporarily. “The Fleckenbühler are implementing the idea of helping people to help themselves in an exemplary manner”, says SAGST project manager Konrad Lampart. “Our organically certified agriculture with its various processing sectors is also an ecological model farm, which is socially and culturally committed to the region as well.”

The Software AG Foundation has been supporting the Fleckenbühler and its various activities for many years, most recently the renovation of a more spacious and accessible farm shop with a café at their main location in Cölbe. Also new is an outdoor area with seating for 50 people. “The farm café has created an attractive rendezvous as well as additional jobs and training positions”, Konrad Lampart explains. Three Fleckenbühl residents were employed in the old farm shop; up to ten people will work in the expanded shop and café, five of them in training positions in the retail, hotel and catering sectors. This means the cultural and gastronomic events will also take place more frequently in the festival barn completed in 2017.