Miele The Miele brand tends to be a luxury appliance brand you might not know exists. Miele started out back in 1899 when businessman Reinhard Zinkann and engineer Carl Miele started a German company that would initially make cream separators for dairies. Miele & Cie. started out with 11 employees and soon afterwards, it started making washing machines. By 1910, the company's washers had their own electric motors, followed in 1912 by a short-lived foray into automobile production. Miele later began producing bicycles in 1924, commercial laundry machines in 1925, and in 1931 came out with the first torpedo-shaped vacuum cleaner with a heat-resistant Bakelite...