A bicycle and a food mill: the two muses of the creator of Moulinex

It's Tuesday, February 16, 1932. With a bundle of papers under his arm, Jean Mantelet has been waiting his turn for some time at the offices of the National Institute of Industrial Property in Paris. Every now and then, he picks up the documents and gives the sketches they contain a final look: he checks the drawing of the rotating disc, the sieve, and the metal bowl, which has a slightly convex bottom. This is precisely one of the features of the food mill he wants to patent. Locked away in his workshop, Mantelet has worked hard to develop a system for making purees without any lumps. At ten minutes to three in the afternoon, an official has already checked everything and stamps the paperwork: with the number 732,100, the Moulin-Légumes has just been patented. This is the invention that launched Jean Mantelet's entrepreneurial career and planted the seed of one of the most renowned French brands in the world. Today, Moulinex is one of the flagship brands of the SEB Group, a European appliance giant whose portfolio also includes Krups, Rowenta, and Tefal, among others. With 32,000 employees worldwide and a presence in 150 countries, it generated €8.26 billion in revenue in 2024. But how did Mantelet manage to make Moulinex one of the most ubiquitous brands in the kitchen?

In 1932, with the patent for the food mill in hand, Jean Mantelet set off to industrial fairs in Lyon and Paris to demonstrate, live, what his brand-new metal device could do. However, he wasn't just selling a product; he was selling a solution. Using it was faster than other methods, and the result was much finer. The invention was an immediate success. Mantelet realized that if he wanted to capitalize on this, mass production was necessary to lower costs and reach many more homes. Between 1933 and 1935, two million units were sold. What had begun as a solution to a domestic problem had become, in just a few years, the core of a company with strong industrial ambitions.

In 1937, his workshop in the small town of Bagnolet became too small, and he moved production to Alençon, in the Normandy region, where he was able to scale the business. By 1953, Mantelet held 93 patents, and the product catalog had expanded considerably. To the original food mill were added mills for chopping raw vegetables, meat slicers, and grinders for salt, pepper, and mustard. All useful, robust, and affordable tools designed to repeat the same action with less effort. However, Moulinex's big leap forward came with the incorporation of electricity into its gadgets.

The electrification of inventions

In the mid-1950s, after years of perfecting manual mechanisms, Jean Mantelet became fascinated by the Vélosolex. It was a Solex moped that had become incredibly popular in France since 1946. In fact, anyone over the age of 14 could drive it without a license. It had a small gasoline engine mounted on the front wheel that made everyday commutes easier. He liked the concept: how a small, well-integrated engine could transform a mechanical invention into something much more efficient. Thus, in 1956, he announced the first electric coffee grinder, called Moulinex. The success of the electric coffee grinder marked a turning point. From then on, Moulinex fully entered the era of small household appliances. In the 1960s, consumption habits changed: time was becoming an increasingly scarce commodity. Moulinex understood this and launched food processors, blenders, and electric choppers. It also built a brand narrative based on utility, simplicity, and time-saving.

In the mid-seventies, at the height of economic liberalization, the company established its first factories in Spain. First in the Basque Country, then in Aragon. In just a few years, the Spanish subsidiary went from manufacturing several hundred thousand appliances to producing millions, eventually controlling nearly a third of the national market. By the early eighties, Moulinex was selling three million household appliances a year in Spain.

From the nineties onward, global competition and industrial costs put the Moulinex model in crisis. In 2001, after filing for bankruptcy, the brand was acquired by the SEB Group and ceased to be an independent company.