Description

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Gebruder Crüwell is a former tobacco factory from the East-Westphalian city of Bielefeld. In 1705, Johann Georg Crüwell was first officially listed as a tobacco manufacturer. The company developed into one of the leading tobacco factories in Germany until production ceased in 1983 due to the arrival of the cigarette. Today there is still a tobacconist’s shop in the historic Crüwell house in Bielefeld. The opera singer Sophie Crüwell comes from the Crüwell family. Before Johann Georg Crüwell was first officially listed as a tobacco manufacturer in 1705, the family was already active in the spice and tobacco trade. When Arnold Crüwell joined the company in 1870, the rise of a regional company to one of the leading tobacco factories in Germany began. On September 30, 1944, the successful development of the company suddenly came to an end. In a bombardment, the entire fabrication of the company, now headed by Arnold Crüwell’s son-in-law, Richard Mitzlaff-Crüwell, was destroyed. After the factory was rebuilt, however, the company encountered a completely different problem: the rise of the cigarette, the change in smoking habits and the late reaction of the company ultimately led to the abandonment of its own production in 1983. However, the company still exists in the form of tobacconists, making it the oldest existing tobacco factory in the world.