The first Breuninger department store, now referred to as its head office outlet, was established in 1881 by
Eduard Breuninger in Stuttgart after taking over the house of E.L. Ostermayer on
Marktplatz. Within years Breuninger had extended the shopping area to the upper floors of the building. In 1888, Breuninger moved his premises to a building in nearby Münzstraße but the lack of space forced him to use both houses for selling again. By 1903 the building had to be replaced by larger premises and after a further two rounds of expansion, in 1931 Breuninger was operating on the new site on Marktstraße. On his death in 1931 the company passed into the hands of Eduard's son, Alfred . Bombing during
World War II wreaked havoc on all premises owned by the retailer. With the death of Alfred in 1947, the company passed into the 3rd generation. Heinz Breuninger took many years to return the retailer to its former glory. In 1952, the company launched its
Breuni bear
mascot which is still used in marketing campaigns today and is a favourite among children. In the 1960s Breuninger underwent a transition from a purveyor of
textiles to a broader scale department store. The number of customers visiting the store from outside Stuttgart had been declining for years so the retailer expanded its range to adapt to changing demands. Expansion took a further new turn in the 1970s with new stores outside Stuttgart. The first "Breuningerland", a major multi-store shopping centre also encompassing sublets, was opened in
Ludwigsburg to the north of Stuttgart in 1973. In 1980 a second Breuningerland was built in
Sindelfingen to the south of Stuttgart. Both sites continue to make a major contribution to company sales. In the 1970s, the owner at the time, Heinz Breuninger started to groom the newly appointed
Willem G. van Agtmael as his successor. Heinz Breuninger died in 1980 at the age of 60 at which point van Agtmael took over at the helm. Van Agtmael forged ahead with expansion plans with the first Breuninger outlets after the fall of the
Berlin Wall in
Dresden and
Leipzig. Nine other outlets have been opened since this time. Since March 2006 the company has been operating its head office outlet as a
flagship store in an attempt to position the shop as a luxury outlet on a par with
Harrods of London. A number of outlets had to be closed in 2006 due to poor sales, including the store in
Würzburg. The Breuninger store in
Dresden was subsequently closed down in February 2008. ==Store trivia, firsts, criticism==