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A place for connoisseurs: the Chocolate Museum in Cologne.
Inseparably linked to the names Imhoff and Stollwerck - the chocolate kings of the Rhine.
Stollwerck, the family dynasty: for 177 years, it stood for "sweets from the Rhine".
And Hans Imhoff, the successful entrepreneur from Cologne's Südstadt district: he saved the company from bankruptcy in the 1970s and led it to new successes.
For many, his best idea: a museum on the "cultural history of chocolate and cocoa", which Imhoff opened directly on the Rhine in 1993.
At the heart of the exhibition is a chocolate fountain where visitors can taste as much as they like. The museum and fountain have been a huge success ever since: more than 600,000 visitors come here every year.
The Stollwerck company, on the other hand, fared less well under Hans Imhoff's leadership: after severe crises - and shortly before the patriarch's death - the Cologne site was finally closed in 2005.
The end of the reign of the chocolate kings of the Rhine.
First broadcast: Friday, October 26, 2018, 8:15 p.m., WDR.
