Fight the alcohol

In 1928 Migros AG bought a juice factory in Meilen that had been founded by members of the Life Reform Movement. Gottlieb Duttweiler not only took over the business, he also took on the movement’s cause, producing juice in order to tackle the alcohol problem.

With the purchase of Alkoholfreier Weine AG, Migros AG changes from retailer to manufacturer. The juice pressing company in Meilen was founded in 1896 with the noble intention of promoting public health. The excessive consumption of cheap spirits and schnapps, above all by the proletariat, is to be combated with apple juice. Well-known doctors such as Maximilian Bircher-Benner, the inventor of Birchermüesli, and Auguste Forel, head of the Burghölzli psychiatric clinic, support the company. However, in 1928 it faces bankruptcy.
By taking over the company, Gottlieb Duttweiler also takes over its founder’s life-reforming commitment. He now comments on the alcohol problem for the first time. In the Brücke he writes: “When juice is fermented into schnapps, it means a loss of strength for the consumer, and, excessively consumed, destruction of health, loss of honour and zest for life for the consumer and those around him.”

The manner in which he redevelops Alkoholfreie Weine AG once again proves Gottlieb Duttweiler's talents as a businessman. As he has incurred large debts in purchasing the factory, he searches for cheap capital. He encourages readers of the Brücke to purchase partner bonds by putting the pivotal question to them: “What is the isolated Migros, standing on its own, against the huge business-making giants of the alcohol capital and the food industry?”
Following his slogan ‘moderate prices – large turnover’, he boosts the turnover of apple juice. He halves the price, sells the bottles only in packs of three and changes the sales vans into ‘drinks vans’. Fitted with a horn – with three tones – the vans tour Zurich and quickly sell off the entire stock of the previously full warehouse in Meilen. Thanks to Migros’ apple juice campaign, the drink attracts new consumers, consumption increases demonstrably and competitors have to lower their prices. Duttweiler confidently boasts about this success: he praises his predecessors in Meilen for “idealism and spirit of sacrifice”. As for himself, he claims that he has “generally solved the alcohol problem – without fanaticism”.