Haribo: Brand Management Across Generations

Why Haribo is instructive for small businesses

Brands that reach a hundred years are rare. Rarer still are those whose core signs have barely changed in that time. Haribo is one of them: a family business from Bonn whose Gold-Bear and slogan almost everyone in Germany knows. For a small business this seems far away, since it has no television budget. That is exactly why it is worth a look, because most of the means by which Haribo has managed its brand across generations are not a question of money.

This case study answers one question: how has Haribo managed its brand across several generations, and what of it can a small business adopt for its own brand? To answer it, I first set out the publicly documented facts, then present the mental model of brand heritage, apply it to Haribo, weigh two perspectives on long-term brand management with Keller (1999), and finally ask about the limits of transfer.

The documented facts: from a kitchen in Bonn to a global brand

According to the company history, Hans Riegel founded Haribo on December 13, 1920, in a small kitchen in Bonn. The name is made up of the first letters of Hans Riegel Bonn. In 1921 his wife Gertrud Riegel became the first employee. In 1922 Hans Riegel invented the Dancing Bear, the predecessor of the Gold-Bear. In 1930 the slogan “Haribo macht Kinder froh” was created. In 1933 the company employed about 400 people.

In 1945 the founder died at the age of 52. In 1946 his sons Hans and Paul Riegel took over management from their mother. Around 1950 about 1,000 people worked for Haribo. In 1960 the Gold-Bears came onto the market, and in 1967 they were registered as a trademark. Other sources date the trademark registration of the name Goldbären to 1975; the information differs here. In the mid-1960s the slogan was extended to “Haribo macht Kinder froh und Erwachsene ebenso.” In 1967 Haribo launched in France.

In 1991 the advertising partnership with the TV host Thomas Gottschalk began, lasting 24 years. Hans Riegel, the founder's son, died in 2013. On May 2, 2018, Haribo opened its new headquarters in Grafschaft near Bonn. In July 2023, production began at its first North American plant in Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin, announced in 2017. Today, according to the company, Haribo employs more than 8,500 people and produces at 16 sites in 11 countries.

The mental model: brand heritage according to Urde, Greyser, and Balmer

From case studies, including on monarchies as corporate brands, Urde, Greyser, and Balmer (2007) developed the concept of brand heritage. They understand it as a dimension of brand identity that shows itself in five elements. Together these form what the authors call the heritage quotient, meaning how much heritage a brand contains.

The authors make a distinction that matters in practice. A brand with a heritage has a long history. A heritage brand makes this history part of its positioning and its promise. As an example they name two watch brands: both have a history, but only one puts it at the center. Making heritage part of the promise is therefore a strategic decision and not an automatic result of age. Brand heritage can also be distinguished from mere nostalgia: it draws on the past but makes it useful for the present.

An old brand is not yet a heritage. It becomes one only when the company decides what of it should remain.

What the model explains about Haribo

If you apply the five elements to the documented facts, one stands out in particular: the symbols. The bear has been the central product image since 1922, as the Gold-Bear since 1960. The slogan has existed since 1930 and was extended only once, not replaced. The advertising partnership with a single face over 24 years is also a form of consistency that is unusual in advertising. Longevity shows in the leadership: after the founder's death, his sons took over in 1946, and the company is still in family hands today.

For the other elements, the picture is less clear. On core values there is little publicly documented; company statements name quality as the foundation on which the founder built. On the question of whether Haribo is a heritage brand in the authors' sense, the following can be said: the company tells its story, for example in a detailed chronicle for its hundredth anniversary. But the core of the promise is not history but the enjoyment the slogan has promised since 1930. In my assessment, Haribo is therefore more a brand with a heritage that consistently maintains its symbols than a brand that sells itself on its age.

Two perspectives: preserve or renew?

Keller (1999) describes long-term brand management as two different tasks. The first is reinforcing a brand. This includes innovation in product, manufacturing, and presentation, maintaining relevance with users and usage occasions, and above all consistency in the support the brand receives, in both amount and kind. The second task is revitalizing: if sources of brand strength have been lost, they must be recaptured or replaced with new ones.

Both tasks can be observed at Haribo. What was preserved were the signs. What was renewed was the circle they address: with the extension of the slogan in the 1960s, adults were explicitly addressed, and with markets such as France from 1967 and its own plant in North America from 2023, the brand was extended geographically. This corresponds to what Keller means by reinforcing: securing relevance with new users without changing the foundation.

I consider this the real lesson of the case. Preserving and renewing are not opposites if it is clear what is being preserved. According to the public facts, Haribo did not touch the signs and instead widened the audience. A business that does the opposite, changing logo, color, and slogan every few years to look modern to the same customers, loses exactly what makes a brand.

What small businesses can transfer

The article branding for small businesses describes consistency on three levels: promise, signs, and behavior. The Haribo case shows how far consistency on the first two levels can carry. For a small business, five steps can be derived from it.

1. Define your own symbols

   Decide which two or three signs make you recognizable: name, color, an image, a sentence. Whatever does not belong to them may change.

2. Put the promise into one sentence

   Since 1930, Haribo has promised in one sentence what the customer gets. How to define such a core promise for all channels is described in the guide defining your core message.

3. Extend rather than replace

   If you want to address new customers, add to the promise, as Haribo did with adults. Do not replace it.

4. Keep one face for a long time

   Whether owner, employee, or partner: if the same person is associated with the brand over years, it builds recognition that no budget can buy.

5. Use your own history

   Use the five elements of brand heritage to check what your business has demonstrably delivered over years. A sentence like “in town since 1987” is evidence, not decoration.

How the brand relates to positioning, that is, to the question of for whom and for which problem the business is the obvious choice, is described in the guide sharpening your positioning.

Limits of transfer

Three limitations belong to this case. First, Haribo is a consumer goods manufacturer with great advertising reach. Consistent signs work there across millions of contacts, in a B2B business across a few hundred. Second, the reasons for decisions are not public: whether consistency was the result of a deliberate strategy or of habit cannot be derived from the facts. Third, the model of Urde, Greyser, and Balmer (2007) is based on case studies and is a conceptual framework, not a statistically tested theory.

Then there is the question of succession. A brand across generations requires that leadership across generations succeeds. In 1946, Haribo went through a transition to the second generation under difficult conditions. How family and business are kept apart in this is addressed in the article running a family business.

Conclusion: what the Haribo case teaches

To answer the guiding question: Haribo has managed its brand across generations by keeping a few signs consistent over a very long time, the bear since 1922 and the slogan since 1930, while widening the circle of customers and markets. The brand heritage model of Urde, Greyser, and Balmer (2007) shows that symbols and longevity in particular carry the brand. Keller's (1999) distinction makes clear that Haribo reinforced its brand rather than reinventing it.

For small businesses, the lesson is not to invent a mascot. It is to define your own signs deliberately, to hold the promise in one sentence, and to design anything new as an extension. The sober observation is this: most brands fail not because of too few ideas but because of too many changes.