Flaschenpost, Durstexpress, and Berlin's Real Beverage Crate Delivery Story

Berlin Didn’t Invent Flaschenpost, But It Built the Company That Almost Beat It

If you assumed Flaschenpost was a Berlin startup, you’re not alone, and you’re not entirely wrong to sense a Berlin connection, you’re just pointing at the wrong company. Flaschenpost was founded in Münster in July 2012 by local entrepreneur Dieter Büchl, began deliveries from a Münster warehouse in October 2014, ran into demand its own logistics couldn’t handle, paused entirely by early 2015, and only relaunched, still from Münster, in April 2016. Berlin never featured in that founding story.

What Berlin actually has is the company Dr. Oetker built specifically to destroy Flaschenpost. In 2017, Oetker’s beverage retail arm, Getränke Hoffmann, launched Durstexpress, a rival same-day crate-delivery service headquartered in Berlin-Alt-Treptow. At its peak in early 2020, Durstexpress ran three separate Berlin warehouses, with the largest, in Charlottenburg, reportedly moving around 80,000 beverage crates a day across a fleet of several hundred vehicles, delivering roughly 1,700 different items within two hours and, notably, without the staircase surcharges that some competitors charged for walk-up buildings.

Then Oetker Just Bought the Rival Instead

Durstexpress never actually out-competed Flaschenpost on the ground. Instead, in October 2020, Oetker’s Radeberger Gruppe acquired Flaschenpost outright for a reported 1 billion euros, buying the very company its own Berlin operation had been built to beat. Starting January 2021, Oetker announced it would fold Durstexpress into Flaschenpost at every shared location, a consolidation that left hundreds of Durstexpress employees at those Berlin warehouses facing an uncertain future, with unions and Berlin politicians publicly raising concerns at the time. The conversion was largely finished by 2021. Try visiting durstexpress.de today, including any old Berlin ordering page, and it redirects straight to flaschenpost.de. There’s no separate Durstexpress operating in Berlin anymore, just Flaschenpost, running partly out of the infrastructure its old rival built.

Photo by Bence Szemerey on Pexels

What Flaschenpost Actually Offers in Berlin Today

Flaschenpost’s own direct entry into Berlin was a separate event from the Durstexpress saga: it launched delivery in the city on June 24, 2020, four months before Oetker even bought the company, initially covering only part of the city with residents checking their postcode online. A full grocery assortment followed in September 2021. As of 2026, Flaschenpost in Berlin delivers around 1,200 drinks, water, beer, wine, spirits, and juice, in roughly two hours on average, ordering Monday to Saturday between 8am and 10pm, with delivery free above a 25 euro order. Its Leergut pickup collects empty crates and bottles at your next delivery automatically, crediting the deposit toward that order, so the whole cycle of getting a full crate up and an empty one back down never actually requires you to leave the building.

Why the Stairs Actually Matter More Here

Munich and Hamburg both have their share of walk-up buildings, but Berlin’s housing stock leans unusually hard into prewar and early-20th-century Altbau construction across Prenzlauer Berg, Neukölln, Friedrichshain, and Charlottenburg, much of it built decades before an elevator was a standard fixture. Under German building law, landlords of existing buildings benefit from Bestandsschutz, a grandfathering protection meaning they can’t be legally forced to retrofit an elevator, and not even a majority vote among tenants can compel it. Current codes only require elevators in new buildings above four stories. Nationally, an ImmoScout24 study found that 51 percent of apartments in buildings of three or more floors have no elevator at all, and Berlin’s Altbau-dense districts sit well inside that share. A retrofit, where it’s even possible, typically runs 50,000 to 150,000 euros and gets passed partly onto tenants as a modernization surcharge. Against that backdrop, a service that leaves a full crate at your actual apartment door, and takes the empty one away again, isn’t solving a mild inconvenience, it’s solving the reason plenty of Berlin households stopped carrying their own water and beer years ago.

Beyond Flaschenpost: Berlin’s Other Delivery Options

Flaschenpost isn’t the only working option, and Berlin’s roster looks noticeably different from Hamburg’s. HoffmannBringts, Getränke Hoffmann’s own delivery arm, genuinely covers Berlin, a real point of contrast with Hamburg, where the identical service is unavailable and only physical stores exist. In Berlin, it delivers from a 50 euro minimum for private customers, waives its fee entirely above 75 euros, and its coverage extends to Brandenburg and Bielefeld as well. Getränke 030, a Wilmersdorf-based operator, focuses on larger orders and party service, delivering “auf Kommission,” meaning unopened surplus bottles from an event can go straight back at no cost rather than being kept or dumped. GRIHED, running out of Spandau since 2013, advertises no minimum order requirement on its own site, a genuinely different model from euro-threshold services, though it does add a Treppengeld, a stair-delivery surcharge, when crates actually have to be carried up rather than left at the door. REWE’s own delivery service remains the option for folding beverages into a full weekly grocery shop, with a roughly 50 euro minimum in Berlin and next-day one to two hour delivery windows rather than same-day speed.

Step by Step

1. Don't repeat the Flaschenpost-was-founded-here mythIt launched in Münster in 2012 and relaunched there in 2016; Berlin's real history is Durstexpress, Oetker's rival brand built to beat it, and later folded into it.
2. For fast, dedicated crate delivery, Flaschenpost is the defaultAbout 1,200 items, roughly two-hour average delivery, free above 25 euros, automatic Leergut pickup for empties.
3. If you'd rather fold beverages into a full grocery order, check REWE or HoffmannBringtsBoth run around a 50 euro minimum in Berlin, with next-day delivery windows rather than same-day speed.
4. Don't assume Getränke Hoffmann means in-person shopping only, the way it does in HamburgHoffmannBringts actually delivers across Berlin, Brandenburg, and Bielefeld.
5. For a party or event, Getränke 030's commission delivery avoids being stuck with unopened surplusUnused bottles can go straight back at no cost.
6. If your building has stairs and no elevator, ask about a Treppengeld before assuming "no minimum order" means no extra chargeGRIHED, for example, waives a minimum but still charges for carrying crates up flights.

Compliance Note

This page compares general company history, delivery terms, minimums, and fees for Berlin beverage delivery services, current as of mid-2026. It is not an endorsement of any specific provider. Corporate ownership, delivery areas, fees, and minimum order values can and do change, confirm current terms directly with the provider before ordering.