Jägermeister , a bittersweet 35 percent ABV Krauterlikör that fits roughly in the digestive category, is the top-selling German spirit brand. In 1878, Wilhelm Mast founded the firm today known as Mast-Jägermeister in Wolfenbüttel, Germany. Originally a vinegar manufactory, the firm later began making liqueurs. Wilhelm’s son Curt (1897–1970) introduced Jägermeister in 1935. Literally “master of the hunt” in German and known colloquially as Jäger, the barrel-aged drink sold 8.5 million nine-liter cases globally in 2019. Other Mast liqueurs such as kümmel were discontinued, leaving the eponymous liqueur, a small number of brand extensions, and Schlehenfeuer, a sloe gin. See kümmel and sloe gin.
In the 1970s Curt Mast’s nephew Günter Mast (1927–2011) aggressively expanded the brand by steering Jägermeister to younger consumers. In 1973, for instance, the company was the first to sponsor a German Bundesliga football team, Eintracht Braunschweig. Mast also spearheaded the cheeky “Einer für alle” (“One for all”) campaign, which featured everyday Germans offering spurious reasons for drinking Jägermeister. American sales, however, totaled little more than five hundred cases annually through the early 1970s. Although older German-born immigrants and German Americans were Jägermeister’s primary consumers, Baton Rouge and New Orleans held pockets of broader interest. Jägermeister achieved a degree of infamy in spots such as the Bourbon Pub, a French Quarter gay bar, and nearby Fritzel’s European Jazz Pub, where German-born owner Gunter “Dutch” Seutter (1929–2003) poured shots for those in the know.
When entrepreneur Sidney Frank spotted a patron drinking the medicinal-tasting liqueur, he sensed opportunity. By 1975, he had secured exclusive American rights. Sales of room-temperature Jägermeister, however, especially in the sometimes hot, humid American southeast where he first acquired rights, remained sluggish. Then came the Valium.
Liquid Valium, Hermann Göring, and the Jägerettes
In 1982 socialite Claus von Bülow was convicted for the attempted murder of his wife, Sunny. At trial, a witness testified that the then-comatose Sunny had advocated using liquid Valium to ease tension. Newspapers reported the sensational testimony, giving the phrase “liquid Valium” a foothold in the American vernacular. Three years later, the Baton Rouge Advocate reported, a regular at Fritzel’s described a frosted shot of Jägermeister as “liquid Valium… . It’ll get you totally wiped out.” College students could not get enough of it. At the Bourbon Pub, student bartender Andrew Pear enthused, “We call it party syrup back at the dorm… . It gets you in a great mood real quick.” The article, while clarifying that they were false, reported rumors that the liqueur contained opium, methaqualone, or other substances that got drinkers high or caused hallucinations, and that it might even be banned. Further, it cemented the idea that Jägermeister be served cold. Sidney Frank had millions of copies made. That, combined with relentless guerrilla promotions that included the Jägermeister Tap Machine, a countertop freezer that assured prominent visibility, and hundreds of attractive young women Frank dubbed the Jägerettes (joined later by Jägerdudes) who provided samples at bars and events, sent sales skyrocketing.
Yet rumors persisted. That the drink contained deer’s blood was easily disprovable; talk of its presumed Nazi origins, less so. In 1935, the Reichsjägergesetz was enacted, a hunting law that established regional German hunting societies, each headed by its own Jägermeister. By law, German hunters were required to be members of these societies. Hunting enthusiast Hermann Göring, later Reichsmarschall and second only to Adolf Hitler, took the title Reichsjägermeister for himself, the Reich’s hunt master. By then, Mast had already registered the liqueur.
Time magazine (April 1, 1940) Göring wore a gold and emerald collar pin featuring a stag’s head with a swastika rendered in sapphires between its antlers. The emblem bears a striking resemblance to historic and modern Jägermeister labels, which feature a Christian cross in place of the swastika.Both the brand and the Reichsjägermeister, however, derived the stag design from the legend of Saint Hubertus, a seventh-century hunter who converted to Christianity when seized by a vision of a great stag with a cross between his antlers. Such stag badges were treasured emblems in German hunting societies long before the Nazis. “Hubertusbitter” in fact had been floated as a brand name. Rumors that hunter Curt Mast was friends with Göring remain that: rumors. No proof has surfaced that the two knew each other. The connection between the brand and the Reichsmarschall were so strong in the popular imagination during World War II, however, that German soldiers gave Jägermeister the joking nickname “Göring-schnaps.”
Göring-schnaps has given way to frozen shots, shooters such as Jäger Bombs (Jägermeister and Red Bull), and more complex cocktails such as the Jägerita (a Margarita variant invented by bartender David Cordoba) that appeal to an older, more sophisticated crowd. See Margarita. Other products include Jägermeister Cold Brew Coffee; Jägermeister Scharf, with additional ginger and galangal; and Manifest, an oaky, luxe 38 percent ABV expression.
See also: amaro; Frank, Sidney; Germany, Switzerland, and Austria; Grey Goose; kräuterlikör; and liqueurs.
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Kumlehn, Jürgen. Curt Mast aus Wolfenbüttel: Eine vorläufige biografische Aufhellung. 2011.
By: Matthew Rowley