Schirm Oertel – European Umbrellas has been synonymous with top-quality handmade umbrellas for over 135 years. Germany’s former largest umbrella specialist has evolved into a highly specialised manufacturing and trading company that now supplies customers worldwide.

Rudolf Oertel founded an umbrella factory and specialist shop in Bremen’s city centre in 1890. The first shop was located on Obernstraße, in a striking classicist building next to St Ansgari’s Church. From the very beginning, the company’s strengths lay in its craftsmanship: turned wooden handles, high-quality wooden sticks and exclusive umbrellas for all weather conditions.

Today, we manufacture one of the most diverse and highest-quality ranges of umbrellas in Europe – including handmade premium umbrellas from our own production. For our handmade collection, we use only materials from within the EU, primarily from Italy, France and Germany. We supply customers all over the world, including royalty and heads of state, film productions and renowned companies.

In addition to our premium products, we also offer promotional umbrellas and customised gift options featuring your company logo – naturally in the usual outstanding Oertel quality.

With the invention of the telescopic pocket umbrella and the rise of ‘Original Knirps’, the first internationally significant umbrella brand, the market changed fundamentally. The umbrella became an industrially manufactured mass product. The successors of the founding generation recognised this change early on – even before the start of the global economic crisis – and discontinued their own production. Instead, they expanded their main business in downtown Bremen and opened additional branches.

After the destruction of the shops in 1944, sales continued at protected locations. The traditional location on Obernstraße remained until 1984. With the takeover of the company by Dorrit and Rainer Gramke in 1984 and the move to the exclusive Sögestraße, Schirm Oertel developed into a unique address for modern designer products. To this day, there is no comparable range in Germany.

Despite its strong roots in tradition and craftsmanship, the company quickly seized the opportunities offered by the internet. The first websites went online as early as 1998: regenschirme.de and european-umbrellas.com. Our website is updated almost daily and continuously expanded – and is praised by many customers as one of the best sources of information and shopping on the internet.

Schirm Oertel has shown that a traditional family business can successfully master the transition to the digital age. Today, we ship our umbrellas to customers in the USA, Russia, Australia, South America, Asia, Switzerland and throughout the EU.

After 135 years of expertise in the umbrella trade, we present ourselves as a company that combines tradition and modernity – open to new business areas in a constantly changing market.