Merkur

Merkur is a German manufacturer of double-edge safety razors based in Solingen, the Rhineland town long associated with cutlery and blade-making. The company was founded in 1896 by Emil Hermes [2] and today operates as MERKUR Stahlwaren GmbH & Co. KG, hand-finishing its razors in Germany and selling them through its own e-commerce shop alongside other channels.

The brand remains active: it continues to run its online store, published a blog post in January 2026 [5], and moved to a new Solingen facility in September 2022. Its safety razors, particularly the long-running 34C model, are widely treated by wet-shaving enthusiasts as a reference point in the category.

Emil Hermes founded the company in Solingen in 1896, a place the brand describes as "renowned for its cutlery expertise." According to Merkur, the name itself was the result of a practical problem: because other steel firms in Solingen already traded under the Hermes name, the founder registered MERKUR — the Roman name for Hermes, the messenger of the gods — as his trademark instead [2].

The company's first product was the Barthobel, an early wet-shaving tool. Around the turn of the twentieth century, Merkur says it pioneered the production of double-edged razor blades, the format that would come to define its catalogue.

Leadership passed to the second generation in the late 1920s, when Emil Hermes's sons Erich and Hans joined the business. The family continued to run the firm through the post-war decades until the 1970s, when, following Erich's death, Dietrich Hermes sold MERKUR Stahlwaren.

A new chapter began in January 1996, when the Kirschbaum family acquired a majority shareholding and established the present legal entity, MERKUR Stahlwaren GmbH & Co. KG [2]. In 2021, Ulrich Wiethoff — who the company says had guided its product line for nearly two decades — became the sole shareholder, succeeding the Kirschbaum family [4]. The following year, in September 2022, the company relocated to a new facility at Nordstr. 10 in Solingen.

Current ownership is recorded differently across sources, and the difference is worth setting out. Merkur's own account names Ulrich Wiethoff as sole shareholder since 2021, operating the independent entity MERKUR Stahlwaren GmbH & Co. KG; the brand's history makes no mention of any DOVO ownership [4]. Business-registry records corroborate Wiethoff's role in the Solingen company [9].

By contrast, specialist wet-shaving editorial has described Merkur as having been "acquired by the Dovo company" and attributes manufacturing to DOVO Solingen [7]. This framing reflects an earlier period when DOVO and Merkur shared management rather than the present structure: registry and community records indicate that after a 2020 bankruptcy the two firms were sold to different owners, with Merkur going to Wiethoff and DOVO to an outside investor group [9]. The brand reportedly continued largely unaffected by that bankruptcy because of how the company was structured [7].

Merkur presents itself as a Solingen heritage manufacturer that pairs traditional craftsmanship with modern production, hand-finishing high-quality double-edge razors in Germany. The company markets under the line "Made in Solingen since 1896" and the German phrasing "Handgefertigt in Solingen · Made in Germany seit 1896," citing more than 125 years of experience.

The audience skews toward wet-shaving enthusiasts and people moving away from cartridge razors, including beginners learning traditional technique. Its range extends beyond razors and blades to shaving brushes, shaving sets, creams, beard care and related accessories.

The 34C, nicknamed "HD" for Heavy Duty, is Merkur's best-known razor and a long-standing fixture of its catalogue, with a design the company traces to the 1950s. Several other models carry similarly long histories: the 33C is described as developed nearly a hundred years ago, while the 23C dates to a design that has, in the brand's words, "proven itself since the 1930s." At the more technical end, the adjustable Futur 700 is positioned as an example of German engineering with variable settings.

The 34C in particular has acquired a strong reputation among specialists. Writing for Sharpologist, reviewer Mantic59 calls Merkur "a major name in the industry" and notes that the 34C's "engineering design and build quality have become a baseline on which other razors are compared." Experienced shavers quoted in the same piece describe it as "the closest thing to an essential razor there is" and a "desert island razor" [7].

Merkur is an active, established manufacturer. It runs its own online shop, maintained a regular blog through early 2026, moved to new premises in 2022, and has had a single owner since 2021. Production remains based in Solingen, Germany.