Sometimes simple inventions can change the world. This is especially true for the coffee filter paper, invented by Frau Amalie Auguste Melitta Bentz 114 years ago in Germany.
If you’ve been at it for a while, working on your dream, and just can’t seem to find a breakthrough, then rest assured that all your efforts are part of a time-proven process.
Napoleon Hill in his book Think and Grow Rich: “If you give up before your goal has been reached, you are a quitter. A quitter never wins, and a winner never quits.”.
This article will show you the secret ingredients to entrepreneurial success if you dare to read between the lines. But most of all, it will take you on a journey with one of the most renowned female entrepreneurs of the 20th century and her quest to get the finest cup of coffee she could imagine.
Melitta Bentz’s burning desire mixed with some imagination
As a housewife, Melitta Bentz found that percolators were prone to over-brewing the coffee, espresso-type machines at the time tended to leave grounds in the drink, and linen bag filters were tiresome to clean.
She experimented with many means, but used blotting paper from her son Willy’s school exercise book and a brass pot punctured using a nail. When the free, less bitter coffee was met with general enthusiasm, she decided to set up a business.
Her story is inspirational. It shows how the entrepreneurial boldness of one woman changed the way millions of people enjoy their coffee in the morning.
How the idea of the coffee paper filter was born
In the days of Melitta Bentz, coffee was brewed by mixing the fine coffee powder with hot water and waiting for the grounds to settle to the bottom of the cup.
Before her simple but ingenious invention, coffee drinkers had to put up with the grounds and their bitter aftertaste. Or some people used linen rags to sieve the grounds, which was messy, and you needed to wash the cloth frequently.
In an interview in 1949, her son Horst Bentz recalled: “My mother, who had an excellent taste in coffee, was often irritated by the coffee grounds in her cup.”
A mother of three, Melitta took it upon herself to find a solution. She experimented in her kitchen until she used the blotting paper from her son’s exercise book. And voila, that’s how she made far-reaching changes in coffee brewing.
Melitta’s coffee filter invention was an instant hit with her friends and neighbors, and she saw the commercial potential of her invention. Thus, she started marketing it after registering it as a utility model.
How many ideas like this are born each day from the burning desire to make a difference worldwide? The only difference between most ideas that never find a market and the coffee filter idea of Melitta Bentz is that she never gave up on working on a prototype until she had one in hand.
An ambitious woman inventor and entrepreneur
In an age when inventions were thought to be the men’s forte, Melitta Bentz’s entrepreneurial journey is a motivational monument. Her story shows that we can all turn a burning desire into a natural solution that benefits others by using our imagination.
Melitta Bentz is among the first women to get a patent. Her new coffee paper filter became the foundation of her entrepreneurial success.
Melitta Bentz’s company started in their five-room apartment in Dresden with an initial capital of just 1 Reichsmark (the German currency of that time) equivalent to US$1.75.
Initially, her company had four workers: her husband, their two sons, and herself. Today, the Melitta Company has more than 3,500 employees across the continents and was worth around 1.8 billion dollars in 2017.
Overcoming the tough times
As mentioned, Melitta Bentz produced the first coffee filters at home. Her boys, Horst and Willy, delivered the coffee filters with a handcart.
At the same time, her husband put up a display in a shop window to show the public how to use the novel coffee filters.
In 1909, the couple presented their coffee filters at the Leipzig Trade Fair. It proved successful as they sold more than 1200 units for 1.25 marks each. In 1912, the company grew to 12 people.
But her business journey wasn’t all rosy. World War 1 came, and Melitta Bentz’s husband, Hugo, and her elder son, Willy Bentz, were drafted into the army. The import of coffee stopped, and the paper used in coffee filters became scarce. So Melitta switched to carton production during the turbulent war to support her family.
In 1923, Willy Bentz became a co-owner of the Melitta company. The company continued growing, and in 1929, they moved to Minden, where the headquarters company is still based today.
Melitta Bentz and her husband stepped down from the company in 1932. The company transformed the pour-over coffee design in 1936 into the popular conical shape still in use today.
Production stopped during World War 2, but resumed after the war.
A woman who never ceased to amaze
Melitta Bentz died in 1950, aged 77, but her legacy lives on. She is credited with several workplace improvements during her time.
They include reducing the number of working days, increasing the number of vacation days, and offering a Christmas bonus for her employees.
In 1938, along with her sons, she founded Melitta, a social fund for her employees that’s still in use today.
At the time of her death, Melitta Bentz’s company had a market value of DM 4.7 million.
In 2020, Melitta Group recorded 1.7 billion euros in sales.
Today, Melitta Group is a company operating in the U.S., Canada, Brazil, and Germany, among others.
Stretching from its humble beginnings till today, the coffee filter company has established numerous subsidiaries, employing thousands of workers.
This brainchild of Melitta shows that innovation and success are not beyond anyone’s reach.
As Napoleon Hill once said: “Some people dream of success, while others wake up and work hard at it (…) Most great people have achieved their greatest success just one step beyond their greatest failure (…).”
Decisiveness, faith, persistence, and endurance seem to be the key characteristics that mark many of the most successful entrepreneurs.
But judging from the countless biographies available, what sets any accomplished entrepreneur apart from those who try, fail, and quit, is the pursuit of a purpose. They desire to create something that goes beyond their personal benefit.
