Hipp Holding

In 1899, Joseph Hipp (1867–1926) started producing rusk flour in his bakery, which had been part of the gingerbread bakers that had existed in Pfaffenhofen for centuries,^[4] which his son Georg Hipp (1905–1967) sold in Munich starting in 1921. Later, the company switched production mainly to "J. Hipp's children's rusk flour", but the gingerbread and wax-drawing workshops continued to operate. After the death of Joseph Hipp, Georg Hipp took over the production of the rusk flour and his mother Maria added a café to the business. In 1932 the business was split up, and his brother Hans Hipp took over the café, which along with the confectionery and gingerbread shop still exists today.^[5]

Georg Hipp founded the company "Nährmittel Hipp" on 1 July 1932. That same year he began to produce baby food in a former hops hall on part of today's company premises. Because of problems with the National Socialists, production was moved to Munich. When the buildings were destroyed in an air raid in 1944, Hipp settled back in Pfaffenhofen. There the company developed into a leading company in the food industry.^[6]

From the mid-1950s, Hipp was the first company in Germany to industrially produce baby food in cans,^[7] but for hygienic reasons of the fruit and vegetable menus have been in jars since 1959/1960.^[8]

In 1964, Georg's son Claus Hipp joined his father's business and he took over management in 1967. For a long time the management consisted of the three brothers Claus Hipp, Georg Johannes Hipp and Paulus Hipp.^[9] Georg Johannes Hipp left in 2010, and over time other family members joined.

In 2016, Hipp took over the plant of the dairy industry company Herford GmbH & Co. KG (MIG) from the DMK subsidiary Humana GmbH in Herford. Milk powder and baby food are manufactured there.^[10]

A recall of Hipp baby food from Spar stores in Austria and Germany was initiated on April 17, 2026, due to concerns that glass packaging might have been contaminated with poison. On April 18, 2026, it was reported that rat poison had been found in a glass jar of vegetable puree in Austria, Czech Republic and Slovakia.^[11]

In 1999, the company's headquarters were relocated to Sachseln, Switzerland, where the Hipp family has been active since 1954 with bio-familia AG, which specializes in organic muesli.^[12]

The history of the subsidiary Somalon is preceded by personal relationships between the couple who founded the company. The Swiss Anny Metzner and the German Georg Hipp met in the canton of Obwalden. The couple often made pilgrimages to holy Brother Klaus in the Flüeli-Ranft pilgrimage site above Sachseln. In Germany, the Hipp family was already successful with baby food. To strengthen Obwalden as a business location and to market baby food from Sachseln, they founded the Somalon company in 1954. The lawyer Caspar Arquint became the director.^[13]

Personal contact with Edwin Bircher, the son of the muesli inventor Max Bircher-Benner, gave rise to the idea of producing ready-to-eat Birchermüesli in Sachseln. Bircher gave the Somalon company permission to call its product "Bio-Birchermüesli" and in 1959 it launched the first Birchermüesli under the brand name "familia". The organic Bircher muesli was successful and was exported to Germany, Austria, England, the Netherlands and the US within a short period of time. As a result, the company was renamed from Somalon to bio-familia in 1978.^[14] As late as 1987, the foreign share was 70 percent, but it fell to 40 percent by 2008 as the company was growing.^[15] Bio-familia AG is a founding member of the Bio Switzerland interest group (IG Bio), which was founded in 2015.^[16] The products are produced both for the company's own brand and for the house brands of major distributors.

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  The administration building
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  Central power building
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  Detailed view of the production site
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  Further view of the site
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  View from the south