Paul-Gerhard Ritter was a smart cookie. When the Berlin Wall tumbled in 1989, Ritter, managing director of the city’s Coca-Cola bottling plant, raced to the scene — not to celebrate or pick up a souvenir chunk of masonry, but to hand free Cokes to East Berliners streaming across the Glienicke Bridge. When an East German guard shouted for one, he and a colleague threw a few boxes over the wall.
Ritter’s quick thinking helped secure East Germany for Coca-Cola, but Germans have long enjoyed America’s iconic soda. Since it arrived there in 1929, Coke and its many rivals have carved out a unique place in Germany’s drinks culture, particularly its beer culture — from the popularity of Spezi, a cola-based non-alcoholic drink made by South German breweries, to the national inclination to blend Coke with beer.
That’s right — in the nation where the beer purity law means brewers in stricter southern states can’t use anything beyond malt, hops, water, and yeast, drinkers are adding cola to beer willy-nilly.
How has Coke secured this remarkable position? It’s a long and fascinating story, involving the rise and fall of the Berlin Wall, American capitalism, East German copycats, Bavarian businessmen, and much more.
Something Old, Something New
When Hollywood’s top filmmaker, Billy Wilder, arrived in Berlin in 1961 to make “One, Two, Three,” a political comedy in which Coke takes a central role, he was hoping for another smash hit to follow “Some Like It Hot” and “The Apartment.” Alas, his timing
