Progress with tradition

In 1851, Arnold André set up a plant in Bünde as a subsidiary of the André brothers tobacco factory in Osnabrück, which had been founded in 1817.

The Arnold André company developed steadily to become one of the major cigar producers in the region. However, the company made its breakthrough on a national level in the 1950s and 1960s.

There were two factors for this success: In 1958, with sound investment and characteristic entrepreneurial foresight, Arnold André was able to very quickly and extensively profit from the abolition of machine prohibition that had been imposed on the cigar industry in 1933 by mechanising all production. This step accompanied the development of the HANDELSGOLD brand: the very first nationally distributed cigar brand in Germany.

Success was tremendous. The HANDELSGOLD cigar brand became an icon of the "economic boom" in post-war Germany like the VW Beetle or the kidney-shaped table. At this time, record levels of employment were reached at around 6000 employees, of which the majority were assigned to work for branches in the towns surrounding Bünde as "homeworkers". The enormous sales success at that time was also the reason for setting up the production plant in Königslutter (1962, already expanded 1964). The plant was set up there - close to the then German national border - due to the large available potential workforce and due to the extensive government aid to border regions known as the "Zonenrandförderung".

The 1970's and 80's were marked by a continuous drop in the consumption of cigars and cigarillos in the traditional (cheroot) form and at the same time by a dramatic downsizing process on the manufacturers' side. The cigars were no longer considered fashionable and the "smoking and health" theme was taken up intensively in the media resulting in further reductions in the numbers of consumer. Arnold André initiated an offensive strategy against this development: focus on the HANDELSGOLD brand was abandoned and supply expanded accordingly to increasingly sophisticated consumer expectations for higher priced Sumatran and Brazilian cigars as well as modern types from the specialist producers of ELBACO, BACHSCHMIDT and GARVES who had been taken over in the meantime. Also, the CLUBMASTER cigarillo series was launched in 1973/74 - which has remained one of the strongest selling cigarillo brands on the German market. These steps ensured that Arnold André maintained its position as market leader.

Also, in the company's international expansion phase which has been taking place for some time, Arnold André took up the offensive: in 1988 25 % of the company shares were transferred to the Dutch EBAS GROUP - which later was taken over by the international Swedish group SWEDISH MATCH, which today holds 40% of Arnold-André shares. Therefore the best conditions were created to sell Arnold-André-products successfully in international markets. In return, Arnold André took over the sale of products manufactured in the Netherlands with the WILLEM II, LA PAZ, JUSTUS VAN MAURIK brands among others.

With the current extensive range offered by Arnold André, the company has thus been able to take full advantage of the "renaissance of the cigar" which emerged in the second half of the 1990s. The long history of Arnold André is also a long story of success. The secret is: we have always quickly recognized "the signs of the times" and taken up successful strategies. In other words: Progress has tradition at Arnold André.