Sold "Madonna"

Sad news for everyone who served in the Western Group of Forces: the mother-of-pearl tea, table and coffee set “Madonna” has not been produced in united Germany for five years now. But returning to the Union at the end of his service in the Western Group with such a service in his luggage was a matter of honor and dignity for every Soviet and then Russian officer. There was a queue for the services by appointment, and political departments regulated its movement as the deadline for the return of a particular officer to his homeland approached.

The porcelain factory in the Saxon town of Colditz produced products famous among our soldiers for several decades. Cups, plates and other tableware items in this series featured transfers stylized as hand-painted antique Meissen porcelain. True, modern artists allowed themselves significantly more imagination in depicting scantily clad ladies on porcelain than their predecessors.

In 1994, the last Russian soldier left Germany, and in 1995, porcelain production in Colditz began to be curtailed. “After the reunification of Germany, our factory was privatized and sold to the Western manufacturer Karl Schumann GmbH,” Colditz mayor Manfred Heinz told the Vremya Novostei newspaper. - The new owner intended to use it as a springboard for an attack on eastern markets. Indeed, during the GDR, more than 75% of the porcelain factory’s products were exported to the Soviet Union and other CMEA countries. However, at a critical time for us, Russia turned out to be insolvent, and state export guarantees through the Hermes insurance company were also not in effect. This meant the end for us. Bringing Colditz porcelain, which once won gold medals at the Leipzig Fair, to Western markets was contrary to the interests of Western manufacturers. They didn't need any extra competition. 1,500 factory workers remained on the street.” I asked the burgomaster where one can now find that mother-of-pearl “Madonna”? “Probably at a flea market somewhere,” he replied.

This, or approximately this, unfortunately, was the fate of the majority of East German enterprises that exported to the fraternal CMEA countries.