our
history
Our business was established more than two centuries ago in 1788.
It has always remained in family ownership and has been managed by family members throughout the entire time.
First Generation
the Beginnings during the 18th century
When our company was founded in Winterthur, Switzerland in 1788, a year before the French Revolution, Switzerland was the largest cotton importer in Continental Europe. Our founders, Kaspar Geilinger (1747-1800) and Christoph Blum (1757-1830), imported raw cotton, traded cotton yarns and exported cotton cloths.
Second Generation
Early growth during the first half of the 19th century
Johann Caspar Reinhart (1798-1871), grandson of Kaspar Geilinger and son-in-law of Christoph Blum, took over the leadership of the company from his predecessors. As an extension to the cotton trading business, the company entered into various financial partnerships in the textile industry, allowing it to sell cotton yarns and cloths in Switzerland but also expanding the export business to the Middle East. Clients and business partners were spread across Constantinople, Smyrna, Beirut, Alexandria and Saloniki.
Business transformation during the 1850s
Johann Caspar altered his business strategy and started to act as an agent and distributor for a number of cotton suppliers from Egypt, Brazil, India and the United States, selling to a vast network of clients in Switzerland, the Austrian Empire, the South German Kingdoms and Principalities, Alsace and Lombardy. It was the time of fast industrialization but also of political and economic changes in Europe. Le Havre became one of the most important cotton import ports on the European Continent. That’s why our first foreign branch office was opened there in 1856, managed by Johann Caspar’s second son, Louis Reinhart.
Third Generation
Intensifying the supplier network during the second half of the 19th century
Paul Reinhart (1836-1905), the eldest son out of Johann Caspar’s second marriage, joined the company as a partner in 1859 and continued to expand the cotton agency and distribution business, especially during the American Civil War when the American cotton crop collapsed, and demand for Egyptian and Indian cotton increased dramatically. With Egypt becoming an ever more important cotton supplier, in 1873, Paul became a partner in the Egyptian cotton exporter F.C. Baines in Alexandria. And years later, he reached an agreement to become the exclusive distributor on the European Continent for McFadden, a large American cotton supplier from Philadelphia.
Fourth Generation
Becoming a cotton merchant at the turn of the century
Paul Reinhart II (1869-1939), the son of Paul, continued the business with new ideas and entrepreneurial spirit after joining the company in 1894, working abroad with suppliers in various cotton origins. He transformed the company once again into a merchandizing business, buying and selling cotton for his own account. In 1907, his younger brother Alfred Reinhart established his own company, Reinhart & Co., Alexandria, strengthening our position as the leading cotton exporters from Egypt. In 1920, after the daughter of Paul II died due to the flu epidemic, he established the Paul Reinhart Pension Fund in her memory, one of the first of its kind in Switzerland.
Fifth Generation
Growing into the largest merchant of “Exotic Cotton Growths” after World War I
Paul Albert Reinhart (1894-1977), eldest son of Paul II, joined the business in 1920. By traveling extensively in the 1920s, the company expanded the variety of traded cotton origins, becoming the largest cotton merchant of so-called exotic cotton growths. Besides the traditional origins from the United States and Egypt, cotton was bought and sold from Argentina, Peru, Mexico, Haiti, West Africa, Belgian Congo, East Africa, Sudan, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Russia, China, and India. During the 1930s, branch offices were established in Bremen, New York, Austin, Sao Paulo, and Buenos Aires giving better direct access in various markets. However, World War II brought the cotton trade to a temporary standstill, creating challenging times for the company but it remained in business by diverting merchandizing activities to other products.
Sixth Generation
Recovery during the second half of the 20th century
Paul Rudolf Reinhart (1923-1997) and Paul Alfred Reinhart (1928-2012), both Paul Albert’s sons, joined the business in 1954 and capitalized on the company’s specialized knowledge in Extra Long Staple (ELS) cotton in order to reestablish themselves again as a leading global cotton merchant. During the 1950s until 1980s, they steadily grew the business back to its former strength, by extending trading activities to cotton producing and developing countries, where the textile industry was expanding faster than in Europe.
Paul Rudolf Reinhart
Paul Alfred Reinhart
Seventh Generation
Expansion and diversification at the turn of the 21st century
In the late 1980s, Dr. Thomas Paul Reinhart (1956), son of Paul Alfred, and Paul Jürg Reinhart (1958), son of Paul Rudolf, joined the business. During the 1990s and the early 2000s the growth of the company became exponential, by further expanding the organization through own branch offices and representations in various origination markets such as Central Asia, West and East Africa, the United States, Mexico, and Australia, and in sales markets such as Central and Eastern Europe, Latin America, and China. The company also invested in various cotton production countries by running own cotton gins as well as by holding minority stakes in ginning companies. Currently we are involved in cotton ginning operations in Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
Throughout the first decade of the 21st century the cotton trade went through a structural change when China joined the WTO bringing along a large textile industry with which many Western textile mills couldn’t compete anymore. This led to a change of cotton trade flows away from Europe into Asia, demanding our company to adapt and shut offices in Europe while opening new branches in Asia such as in India where Reinhart India Pvt Ltd was incorporated in 2010.
Dr. Thomas Paul Reinhart
Paul Jürg Reinhart
Eight Generation
Horizontal diversification
While the previous few decades led our business into upstream diversification, the 2010s and 2020s mark a time of horizontal diversification into other products such as raw cashew nuts (RCN), sesame, chickpeas, soybeans and other niche agricultural products. It is also the time when the sons of Jürg joined the business; Lorenz Reinhart in 2013, and Adrian Reinhart in 2021.
