Max Brenner - History

History

Max Brenner was founded in 1996 in Ra'anana, Israel, by Max Fichtman and Oded Brenner who combined their names. The business began as a small shop selling handmade chocolates.

In the early 1990s, Israeli born Oded Brenner worked in pastry shops apprenticing to the legendary likes of George Maushagen in Germany and at Fauchon in Paris. It was at that time that he said he “fell in love with the happiness chocolate brought people.” Working as an apprentice in Paris in 1994, Brenner met well-known chocolatier Michel Chaudun and convinced the maestro to take him on. Oded Brenner spent six years learning the art of chocolate-making in Paris.

Upon his return to Israel in 1996, Brenner opened a small retail chocolate shop with a workshop in the back. It was there that his Wonka-esque proclivities began to come to the fore. Having experienced the branding brilliance of Thierry Mugler and Jean Paul Gaultier in Paris, Brenner said he came to see chocolate as “an emotional product that should be experienced through all senses.”

The result was the opening of "Handmade Chocolate by Max Brenner"—derived from Oded’s last name and co-founder Max Fichtman’s first name—in Ra’anana, just outside Tel Aviv. By 1999, Fichtman and Brenner had opened ten chocolate shops. Later, Brenner bought out his partner and embraced the Chocolate by the Bald Man concept, adopting the nickname Max.

After early success, Oded "Max" Brenner aspired to take chocolate to a whole new level. In time, the idea of “creating a chocolate culture” developed; a culture, which would acquaint people with the entire story of chocolate, reveal ancient secrets, and revitalize traditions that had been lost over the years.

“I think most people think of chocolate like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, as fun and happiness, childhood memories and romance. They can only experience all this in their dreams. Then I knew what I wanted to create: a 3D chocolate experience, to tell the chocolate story in a very broad way; a way that hadn’t ever been done before. I wanted to create a chocolate culture.”

A chance meeting with an Israeli entrepreneur in 1999 sparked the idea of expanding his business, and the first of the Max Brenner-branded cafes opened in Australia, in Sydney's hip Paddington, in 2000. This newly opened “Max Brenner Chocolate Bar” was to be the centre of Max’s new chocolate culture, combining a bar and a shop. This allowed people to enjoy a “holistic” chocolate adventure, experiencing their shopping in the bar section and shopping their experience in the shop section.

Max Brenner operates Chocolate Bars in Israel, Australia, Philippines, Singapore and the United States. In 2010, a new Max Brenner restaurant and chocolate store opened at Caesars Palace, Las Vegas. In 2011, another branch opened in Boston.

According to the founders of Max Brenner, "chocolate is not just about taste. It’s a symbol of different aspects in our lives - of romance, of sensuality, of decadence. These aspects actually create the new chocolate culture of Max Brenner." In 2009, Oded Brenner explained the philosophy behind his chocolate enterprise: "Chocolate to me is European so the restaurant is part Parisian cafe. Then I added some Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I added spices from all over the world that we use to create our chocolates. And then part of it is like a lab - like a drugstore."

Max Brenner chocolates are certified kosher by the Nazareth Rabbinate.

Max Brenner restaurants offer a vast array of chocolate-based dishes, but no chocolate based entreés. The chocolate menu includes chocolate waffles and crepes, fondues, ice creams, hot chocolate drinks, smoothies and chocolate martinis. Max Brenner's chocolate pizza was featured in a February 2011 segment of Food Network's The Best Thing I Ever Ate/Pizza.