Hans Riegel, Marketer of Gummi Bears, Dies at 90 Rolf Vennenbernd/DPA, via Associated Press Hans Riegel oversaw sales and marketing for the candy maker. By MELISSA EDDY Published: October 15, 2013 Hans Riegel, who made the rainbow-colored, fruit-flavored, teddy bear-shaped gelatin sweets known as gummi bears a global favorite, died on Tuesday in Bonn. He was 90. The cause was heart failure, Haribo, the company he led for nearly seven decades, said in a statement, adding that he had surgery to remove a benign tumor in his brain several months ago. Mr. Riegel transformed his family-owned company from a local candy maker with 30 workers into an internationally recognized brand with 6,000 employees around the world and annual sales of $2 billion to $2.7 billion. Mr. Riegel’s father, also named Hans Riegel, founded Haribo in 1920. (The name is an acronym derived from his first and last name and the city where it was registered, Bonn.) The elder Mr. Riegel concocted the first bear-shaped sweets, initially out of licorice. After their father was killed in 1945, during World War II, Mr. Riegel and his younger brother, Paul, set about rebuilding the business. Paul was responsible for production, while Hans oversaw sales and marketing. The brothers introduced the sweets they called “gold bears,” known to most of the world as gummi bears, in the 1960s. The little bears, which come in five colors and flavors, proved immensely popular with Germans, and Mr. Riegel soon expanded abroad. After successfully introducing them in Britain, Sweden and Austria in the 1970s, he took them to the United States in 1982, setting up Haribo of America in Baltimore.
Posted on: Sun, 27 Oct 2013 17:39:51 +0000
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