On May 15, 1887, watchmaker Rudolf Flume, a native of Lünen in Westphalia, founded the company in Berlin Centre as a "specialist company for watchmaking supplies". With entrepreneurial vision, he recognised early on the opportunities offered by establishing a complete supply system for watchmakers from a central location for essentials, watch parts, tools, as well as watch chains.

Then 27 years old, the entrepreneur, who ventured into self-employment with one employee, already set the standards on which company policy has been based for over a century. From the start, Rudolf Flume dedicated himself to the establishment of a jewellery department with a sales department that would soon have 14 "travel depots" and visited the speciality shops. Wherever technical innovations develop, the team strives to make them available for the watch and jewellery industry.

Tradition and Progress
In autumn of 1911, a "monumental opus" is finally published that best illustrates the comprehensive services the company already had to offer at that time. The catalogue with more than 1,000-page, published for the 25th anniversary, includes everything, from evaporation trays, anchor wheels, and winding shafts to dials and compilations of sets and tools. For the first time, all equipment speciality shops require is described in full.

After the early years of the first major successes, still in the Imperial Era, the following decades sometimes brought with them rather difficult times for the second generation.

More than 100 Years of Customer Service
It is the great merit of Walter Flume and Emil Ziegler to have successfully overcome the troubles of two world wars and the recession in between. In 1951, together with Fritzheinrich Pachnio, they built the foundations for today's modern development of the company.

Flume Technik - A Look Back
In 1994, there was some reorganisation under the umbrella of RUDOLF FLUME GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin, separating the company into two operating subsidiaries, Rudolf Flume Schmuck GmbH, Berlin, and Rudolf Flume GmbH, Essen.

Due to ongoing consumer uncertainty and the poor economic forecasts, Schmuck GmbH was wound up again in 1997. Lukas von Cranach and Rudolf W. Flume, the great-grandson of the founder, joined the management team and refocussed the Flume's goals on its core business, the technology trade.

In 2004, Flume was incorporated in the Wagner group of companies. With Dirk Langmann becoming the new CEO, the company also underwent a strategic reorientation. The main objective, aside from improving efficiency, is to ensure greater proximity to customers and to meet the needs of the speciality trade for competent all-round care.

In February 2014, Julius Sobizack and Uwe Rücker took over the management of the company.