Locals are buying Hoffmann properties in Defiance. ‘We want to bring some positivity back.’ (2024)

ST. CHARLES COUNTY — Three years after billionaire investors David and Jerri Hoffmann bought up businesses and properties in Defiance and Augusta, with plans to create Missouri’s version of Napa Valley, most have been closed or put up for sale.

Now, at least one has returned to local ownership.

Defiance residents Tiffany and Larry Winkler bought the long, green building in the town’s center from the Florida-based Hoffmann Family of Companies in March, with plans to turn the former bike rental business into an “indoor farmer’s market.”

“We want to bring some positivity back to Defiance, open it back up,” Tiffany Winkler said. “We’re all bummed to see things bought up and then shut down.”

In 2021, company founders and Washington natives David and Jerri Hoffmann announced they would invest $150 million in purchasing existing wineries, planting new vineyards, constructing a hotel and convention center, building a golf course, and opening a five-star restaurant, among other endeavors in Augusta and Defiance.

Now, more than a dozen properties, some still sporting signage with the Hoffmann name, are listed for sale. Most are in Augusta, including a gallery, gas station, a bed and breakfast, and a coffee shop.

But about 8 miles away in Defiance, two of the three Hoffmann assets are under new ownership or will be within months. Only a bar remains on the market.

Besides the trio of Hoffmann businesses, Defiance, an unincorporated community over 50 square miles with fewer than 200 residents, has only two wineries, a brewery, two plant nurseries, a post office, a church and a few lodging options.

David Hoffmann, former CEO and current chairman, said the company’s strategy for the region remains intact.

The Hoffmann Family of Companies is “just selling a few non-essential businesses and properties — very small part of the project,” he told the Post-Dispatch in a text message. Hoffmann said they prefer to lease the properties but will sell if it makes sense.

Of the buildings for sale, a handful have been spoken for, Hoffmann said.

That comprises “less than $4 million of value out of a multibillion dollar company,” he said. “This is just not a big move for us as we are a global company with hundreds of locations.”

Tiffany Winkler said hers is the first local family to buy a Hoffmann building, the bright green structure at 2998 Highway 94. They are opening a storefront for their beef and pork farm, Circle 6 Acres, and will sell food products such as produce, bread and honey from a dozen local farmers, she said.

A food truck serving food from their farm, like wagyu burgers and pork belly bites, will be parked outside Circle 6, Winkler said. They plan on hosting live music, and visitors will be able to rent bikes, a nod to the building’s previous tenant, a bike rental and repair shop.

Resident Victoria Meder will continue to lease and operate the Defiance General Store on the other side of the green building, which sold for $425,000 — about $60,000 less than when the Hoffmanns bought it in 2021, according to a real estate website.

The space is being gutted and renovated. Winkler said they hope to open Memorial Day weekend.

“I truly feel like God’s hand is on this project for us,” she said. “The community response to what we’re doing is so encouraging. Everyone is ready for us to open.”

Across the street, Marla Conn is gearing up to open Wente’s Roadhouse in the old Defiance Roadhouse building, at 2999 Highway 94. The original Wente’s restaurant is in Chesterfield.

Conn said she is leasing-to-own from the Hoffmanns and hopes to own the entire building within six months.

She originally wasn’t looking to expand, she said, but was struck by Defiance and its community. She said she hopes Wente’s Roadhouse will become a local staple, the kind of place residents come to read the newspaper with a cup of coffee in the morning.

“It’s very charming and very welcoming,” Conn said of Defiance. “It’s a world away, a very special little nook.”

Since signing the lease agreement in April, Conn has decluttered the space, repainted walls and repaired pipes. Wente’s Roadhouse will have the same menu as its Chesterfield location — ribs, wings, pizza and burgers — plus breakfast. It is slated to open May 19 and will have live music.

“I want to get really settled here,” Conn said.

Meder, of the general store, said at first some residents were excited when the Hoffmanns came into Defiance because the couple had a vision of how to help a “sleepy, dying town.”

She signed a two-year lease with the Hoffmanns in 2023 for the general store space. She had no idea the company would be selling its properties, she said.

Now, she hopes that new business owners buying up the Hoffmann properties will help make Defiance a bigger destination.

“If we have all these places opening back up, the people that are coming into Defiance have a place to stop here, a place to stop there,” said Winkler, of Circle 6. “Who’s going to come out to Defiance for just one place?”

But more importantly, she said, locals are changing the town for themselves.

“What do we have when commerce is slow?” Winkler said. “In the wintertime, there’s nothing to do here. I don’t know if Hoffmann totally knew that about our area.”

Editor’s note: This story was updated Monday at 10:49 a.m. to correct the spelling of Victoria Meder's name.