"Germany needs guts" was the ambiguous campaign with which Little Red Riding Hood-Mumm wanted to make Germans optimistic and make themselves better known 20 years ago.

It was the year in which the Freyburg sparkling wine producer Rotkäppchen completed the most important acquisition in the company's history up to that point, with the takeover of Mumm, Jules Mumm and "MM Extra" together with their locations in Eltville am Rhein and Hochheim am Main.

Oliver Bock

Correspondent for the Rhein-Main-Zeitung for the Rheingau-Taunus district and for Wiesbaden.

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An East German sparkling wine house had suddenly become Germany's market leader for sparkling wine, and a new chapter was added to the long brand history of Mumm and "MM".

While "MM" - the initials stand for the founder Matheus Müller - celebrated his 200th birthday in 2011, Mumm's hundredth is on the calendar on May 2nd.

Little Red Riding Hood Mumm is happy that the successful Mumm brand has an awareness level of more than 80 percent and thus one of the best values ​​in the industry.

The claim from the television advertisement – ​​“Sometimes it just has to be guts” – became a catchy tune for a whole generation as early as the 1980s.

A success that Godefroy H. von Mumm could hardly have had in mind when he founded the sparkling wine and wine trading company trading under his name on May 2, 1922.

The branched Mumm story goes back much further into the past.

As early as 1827, the brothers Gottlieb, Jacobus and Philipp Mumm founded the PA Mumm champagne cellars in Reims.

With the company name, they honored their father Peter Arnold Mumm, who, as a banker and wine merchant, had temporarily run his business from Frankfurt.

It was he who made a fabulous profit with a bold speculation on the 1811 Schloss Johannisberg comet vintage and then founded his own winery, which was later named after him.

The descendants acquired Schwarzenstein Castle in Johannisberg in 1873.

Second place in the sparkling wine brand ranking

After his death in 1852, Mumm's company was split into GH Mumm & Co. and Jules Mumm & Co. Jules Mumm only retained the rights to the name after 1910.

In the run-up to the First World War, the tribe of the Mumm family living in Reims had been expropriated and returned to Germany.

The Société GH Mumm was founded in Reims in 1920 and still produces classic champagne today.

In Germany, the Sekthaus Mumm & Co. was founded in Frankfurt in 1922 to differentiate and differentiate, which has operated as Sektkellerei GH von Mumm & Co. since 1933.

Despite the common name "Mumm", there is hardly any risk of confusion: French Mumm champagne is marketed at entry-level prices above the 30 euro mark.

Mumm vintage sparkling wine from Eltville, on the other hand, is sometimes sold for 3.79 euros, although Rotkäppchen-Mumm recommends 5.99 euros per bottle to retailers.

The aggressive actions of the trade are the price that Mumm has to pay for its second place in the sect's brand ranking.

Composed of French, Italian and Spanish base wines, the sparkling wine ranks behind Little Red Riding Hood but ahead of Freixenet.

Mumm owes its reputation as a classic dry sparkling wine brand to Seagram's commitment after taking over the brand in the 1970s.

50 million bottles by the end of the 1980s

At that time, the brand initially took off with great success: "Mumm Selection" flew exclusively for Lufthansa at a time when airplanes were not yet a cheap means of mass transport.

Almost 50 million bottles were sold by the late 1980s.

The exclusivity was over when "Mumm" increasingly and inexpensively ended up on the shelves of supermarkets.

In 1998 "Jules Mumm" was added as a brand extension and aimed at the expectations of a young target group with an unusual design, sweet taste and trendy advertising.

Mumm is now available in many variants, including dry and extra dry, rosé and - white and pink - also non-alcoholic.

Initially, the sparkling wines were dealcoholized in Rüdesheim, but due to the growing market, the group invested in its own dealcoholization plant in Eltville a few years ago.

As early as the 1990s, Mumm itself opted for a rather puristic appearance on the shelves.

For the past two years, there have also been wines made from the Riesling, Pinot Noir and Chardonnay grape varieties under the Mumm name.

The Riesling comes from producers in Rheinhessen, the Pinot Noir from Württemberg and the Chardonnay from the Palatinate.

Brand director Cathrin Duppel is not worried about "Mumm" in the future, even if the development continues: "You are never finished with a brand."