The history of Schmidt Spiele

It all began with Mensch ärgere Dich nicht®...

The game of frustration that everyone knows, with the grouchy man on the box. From the Baltic Sea to Lake Constance, the game is a household name throughout Germany, causing frustration wherever it goes. And endless hours of fun...Despite the lucky guy’s face on millions of bright red boxes, a place of honor in Bonn’s “Haus der Geschichte”, and cult status on the board game scene, the man in the black suit still won’t cheer up. But who really cares? In the end, the old sourpuss hasn’t managed to spoil our fun – or that of our parents, grandparents and great grandparents – for over 100 years! It’s as fun as ever before! Mensch ärgere Dich nicht®

 

Josef Friedrich Schmidt

In the early 1900s, Josef Friedrich Schmidt – a native of Amberg, Germany – invented the game in a small garage in a working-class neighborhood of Munich called Giesing. As the mother of all games, it’s a true classic that quickly “rose to become the most popular game of the nation” (Der Spiegel).This evergreen bestseller, where nothing is more satisfying than frustrating yourself and others, is still the driving force that keeps the momentum of one of the most longstanding and popular brand names on the German game market going so strong today. And it has emboldened us to go places where others wouldn't dare: Schmidt Spiele.