Children loved the mascot and urged their parents to buy the “Adventures of the Minol Pirol” at newsstands.

In 1992, Minol was purchased by Eleven (ELF), which went on to form the third part of TotalFinaElf in 2000 (eventually emerging as Total in 2003). Shortly afterwards, the Minol Pirol appeared to have flown the coop. The last Minol gas station closed in former East Germany, and with it the pink and yellow logo and the Minol Pirol disappeared.

Total now ranks fourth among Germany’s biggest oil companies (Aral, Shell and Esso hold the top spots) and is currently rebranding its 1,200 gas stations, which are still operating under diverse brand names like Elf and Fina, to its main identity as Total.

Now Minol has returned with a station on the Allee der Kosmonauten in Berlin. The station is adorned with the pink M on a yellow disk, first introduced in the early 90s, and sells East German favorites like Spreewald pickles and F6 cigarettes. Why is Total opening a station under the Minol brand at the same time as it works to consolidate other identities into one?

The strategy seems to be in part benefiting from a trend called “ostalgie,” a coined word for nostalgia for the East. Those caught up in ostalgie yearn for a time when everyone had a job and there was more leisure time, when there was less capitalist frenzy and less information overload – in other words, the “good old days” of East Germany.

Those who were only children when the Berlin wall was up are now throwing ostalgie parties, dancing to GDR hits, and chugging Rotkäppchen (East German sparkling wine). Travel agencies offer ostalgie tours. Supermarket shelves are lined with old East German products like Vita-Cola, Othello cookies and Mokka Fix Gold coffee. Amazon.de hosts a large ostalgie category of records and books. Minol’s resurrection would appear to be taking advantage of this trend.

But according to Total’s public communications, the revival of Minol has less to do with the ostalgie trend and more to do with the trademark on the Minol brand. While the company acknowledges the brand’s equity in former East Germany, it says it does not intend to position Minol as a second national or regional sub-brand. Instead, it just needed to use the trademark before it lost ownership.

In the EU, brand owners must use their trademarks within 5 years of registering (or in the case of Minol, last usage) to retain their rights to the mark. The last Minol station closed in 2000, which gave Total until 2005 to use the mark again. (In the US, that law is stricter: Trademarks must be used within two years of registering or last use).

What Total’s use of the Minol mark teaches us is that equity can be found in unlikely places. While it is important to protect one’s brands from infringements by business rivals, it is equally important to keep track of one’s brand portfolio and to develop strategies for possibly re-animating passive or stored brands.

Total decided to use its brand and avoid the chance that someone else could gain ownership of it. It may not necessarily instantly pay off financially, but the brand owners hit on a trend, and could conceivably turn it into a very profitable line of business going forward.

General Trademark Rules for the European Union

Slaven Marinovich is a freelance writer in Hamburg, Germany.