Miele Through the Years: Q&A with Markus Miele & Reinhard Zinkann

In 1899, Carl Miele and Reinhard Zinkann founded Miele & Cie. in the German town of Herzebrock with a small factory, 11 employees, and one product: cream separators. Having manufactured everything from washing machines to bicycles, the company celebrates its 116th year as a family business. Today, the founders’ great-grandsons, Markus Miele and Reinhard Zinkann, oversee a brand that—while smaller in scale than the Whirlpools of the world—operates as a true global player. (In Hidden Champions of the Twenty-First Century, author Hermann Simon reports that "it generates 73 percent of its revenues outside its home market, an unusually high percentage for an appliance maker.") Dwell sat down with Miele and Zinkann to find out how they retain their supremacy in a competitive industry while staying on the cutting edge of technology.