Herzlieb-Serie
I was three years old – that was in 1975. My parents, my aunt and my uncle usually spent their summer vacations together in southern Europe and their winter vacations in the Austrian mountains.
Of course, back then you only traveled by car and both you and the car needed a break every now and then. You made this stop at the various motorway service stations in Germany and discovered the cuddly pillows from the Herzlieb series in their sales rooms and brought me “my first cat” from this Herzlieb series as a gift.
Cats have always been my aunt and I’s favorite animals.
What joy when she gave me my first cuddly pillow in the shape of a cat! Year after year passed and because of the holiday gifts I always had at least two of these cats. They were so wonderfully soft and cuddly, had a sweet face and were the perfect companions for a good night.
I loved it and carried it with me everywhere. Over the years I have seen many cats come and go because they were so worn out and worn out that the fabric was torn in all places and the stuffing fell out.
Then the time had usually come for my mother to throw them in the trash! I often secretly took the cats out of the old, round garbage can from the 1970s.
My preference was always for stuffed animals – I didn’t like dolls. Of course I had a doll’s pram and a doll’s cart in which I preferred to take my stuffed animals and the cats Mizzy and Mohrle out. This caused some astonishment in the neighborhood, especially from older women. When I was walking down our street, they would tell me what a beautiful doll I was taking out and would be stunned when they saw the stuffed cat/cuddly cat with its tongue sticking out!
Initially the design of the “fur” was a bit mottled and printed with color gradients. At the end of the 70s it was kept simpler, as it still looks today. In 1978 my brother was born. Of course he also got these cuddly pillows as a holiday souvenir. Over the years he had been given the black cat Mohrle, the black rabbit Hoppel and the green frog Quack.
These cuddly pillows were my loyal companions until the late 80s. They had to go everywhere. On vacation, to stay overnight with the family or with my friends. Depending on which of the cats were available at the motorway service stations, I had the red cat Mizzy or the black cat Mohrle. At some point, these cuddly pillows disappeared from the scene for a long time. They were no longer offered at motorway service stations. My aunt and uncle were desperately looking for them. They stopped at every rest stop on the way back from vacation, but unfortunately to no avail.
It wasn’t until 1991, on our first vacation together with my then boyfriend and now husband, that we discovered these cuddly pillows as Mohrle the cat in a toy store in Bayreuth. Great joy and cheers. The saleswomen were somewhat stunned! Of course I bought two cats – one for me and one for my brother. During another vacation in Mittenwald in 1993, the cats Mohrle and Mizzy were offered in a souvenir shop. Of course I had to buy them! Certainly other motifs from the Herzlieb series were also offered there, but unfortunately I don’t remember them. My attention was always on the cats. On a day trip to Innsbruck we discovered the red cat Mizzy in a toy store. The equivalent of DM 26.00 at the time – that was very expensive. But she was the last cat hanging on a display stand there and I couldn’t possibly leave her alone!
I slowly got my husband to become dependent on these cuddly pillows.
Years later we still had the opportunity to place an order directly with the original manufacturer, Dressler-Wallach in Reiskirchen, and we still have a few cats Mizzy and Mohrle from Super -Series and mini-series ordered.
In the Super series the cuddly pillows have a format of around 40 x 35 cm and the Mini series 30 x 20 cm. All cuddly pillow motifs are available in both sizes.
Now we were well stocked!
So I contacted the Kuschelherz company and ordered the cats Mohrle and Mizzy again. That was a nice contact with the owner, Hans-Oswin Pannier, who was already of retirement age at the time.
In 2012, I accidentally came across the company Kuschelherz from Zülpich while researching the Herzlieb series on the Internet.
In October 2021, I became aware of a search for the Penguin Charly cuddly pillow from the Herzlieb series on eBay classifieds and immediately thought of contacting the Kuschelherz company, Mr. Pannier. Charly the Penguin’s search was described so emotionally and urgently that I had to act. Did the Kuschelherz company still exist and was my contact details still up to date?
This took over the Herzlieb series division from Dressler-Wallach from Reiskirchen in 2002. In the meantime our supply of cuddly pillows had decreased, also because I had some had given away.
It was you! Mr. Pannier remembered me very well, even though my order was 10 years ago. We had a nice phone conversation in which he told me that last year, due to Corona, he had given away almost his entire stock of cuddly pillows to kindergartens and schools in his region. In this respect, he could not say with certainty whether Charly the penguin was still in stock.
He also reported that he wanted to give up the business for health and age reasons. So he spontaneously asked me if I would like to take over the Herzlieb series collection. Yikes!
Of course, this came as a complete surprise and unprepared. Of course he gave me time to think about it. I should just get back to you and let you know what my decision was. In fact, I loved the basic idea. “My favorites” from childhood and now I could become the owner of the Herzlieb series collection? Crazy and incredible, but not unattainable. My husband wasn’t averse to the idea, in fact he was also quite fond of it and, as they say, the drama began!
