Friesland Porzellan
German porcelain and ceramics manufacturer
Friesland Porzellanfabrik GmbH & Co. KG, based in Varel-Rahling, Germany, in the Friesland district, is a German manufacturer of porcelain, stoneware and earthenware, in particular coffee and table services for everyday and upscale needs. It was originally founded in 1953 as a subsidiary of Melitta-Werke Bentz & Sohn producing under the "Melitta" label. In 1982, they started to also manufacture under their own "Friesland Germany" brand, finally becoming independent of Melitta in 1995. After several restructures in the 2000s, Friesland Porzellanfabrik GmbH was taken over by the Dutch company Royal Goedewaagen in spring 2019. The headquarters of the new corporate group RGW Friesland Porzellan Gruppe is still in Varel. The Royal Goedewaagen Group became the Bornego Group in 2021.
History
On 13 August 1948, the Niedersächsisches Ministerium für Wirtschaft und Verkehr ('Lower Saxony Ministry of Economics and Transport') granted the merchant August Heinrich Caspritz, who came from Tolkemit, permission to build and operate a factory for the production of electrical porcelain, stove tiles and tableware on the site of a former anti-aircraft equipment depot. After bankruptcy in 1953, the factory was continued by Horst Wolfgang Bentz under the name Porzellanfabrik Friesland, Zweigniederlassung Melitta-Werke Bentz & Sohn as part of the Melitta group of companies. This was Melitta's response to the barely satisfied demand for coffee filters, as, after the Second World War, Melitta's former paper filter factory in Kreuzau near Düren had been destroyed and the Concordia porcelain factory in Sadov-Lesov (formerly Sodau-Lessau), which was used by Melitta between 1941 and 1945, was now located in the Czechoslovakia.
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