PARIS — It’s the late 1990s, and Emmaus charity shops are overflowing with stacks of old Michelin guides that nobody is paying attention to. A few years later, it’s impossible to find an old red guide. An auction at the first International Convention of Michelin Collectors, held in Clermont-Ferrand in 2000, saw one fan pay more than 5,000 euros for the 1900 edition.
The fan in question was Pierre Troisgros (1928-2020), a three-star Michelin chef famous for his salmon with sorrel sauce. He had been looking for the edition for 20 years. Today, the hammer price for this very first French guide is 28,000 euros, excluding fees.
The edition is the Holy Grail of all collectors, with a preface that states “this work will appear with the century” and “will last as long as it does.” That year, 2,887 motor vehicles were registered in France. The two Michelin brothers were firm believers in the development of the automobile, and had more than 32,000 guides printed, free of charge at the time, not only for pioneering motorists, but also for tourists and cyclists. Four hundred pages listed where to buy supplies, repair your vehicle and find shelter, with 1,300 hotels mentioned.
It is estimated that there are around a hundred copies in circulation worldwide. Bernard Noby, a collector since the late 1970s and a former chef, said that “initially, those who kept Michelin guides were car collectors who looked for the year of their vehicle to put in the glove compartment.” In the 1950s, many automobile clubs published a Michelin guide in their own colors.
A guide for the very first motorists
Hotel and restaurant owners also took an interest, acquiring editions in which their establishments were listed. Over the years, a whole host of guides graced the shelves. Noby had acquired a copy dating from 1931, which he left available for his customers in the inn he managed.
“Many of them leafed through it. It got me thinking,” Noby recalls. Alexandre Dumaine (1895-1974), a three-star chef in Saulieu (in Burgundy’s Côte-d’Or department), who prepared veal sweetbreads with spinach for Salvador Dali and Charlie Chaplin, was renowned for his collection, which he left to his successor, Bernard Loiseau. The latter sold it to journalist Dominique Chapatte, creator of the M6 TV show Turbo. From gastronomy to mechanics, there’s really only one step.
There are between 3,000 and 4,000 Michelin Guide collectors worldwide, and around 500 in France.
In 2000, the Association of guides and cards collectors (ACGCM) was founded, bringing together 300 members and publishing catalogs listing Michelin guides and objects. There are said to be hundreds of thousands of them, created at a time when each division of the company was autonomous in devising its own advertising derivatives.
Pierre-Gabriel Gonzalez, a journalist specializing in Michelin’s history, who initiated the international collectors convention, estimates that there are between 3,000 and 4,000 collectors worldwide, and around 500 in France. He is quick to point out the role played by André Michelin, the engineer who became a man of communication.
“He found the right color. And the right format: from 1907 onwards, we practically had the guide as we know it today,” Gonzalez says.
In 1944, an edition for GIs
In addition to 1900, one of the most sought-after copies is the 1939 edition, known as the “American” guide. In 1944, at Washington’s request, Michelin reissued the 1939 edition (the last before the war) for GIs participating in the D-Day landings. The book was not red but yellow, with mediocre-quality paper, tucked into the officers’ fatigues to help them find their way around France, thanks to detailed maps of the main cities and the location of official buildings. The current price is around 5,000 euros each.
Other editions make enthusiasts’ eyes sparkle. Starting with the so-called “large margins” guides, a larger format — similar to an A4 or letter-sized sheet of paper — that allowed customers to write notes around the texts.
The first edition of the Spanish guide, 1910, is one of the most prized.
There were also “deluxe” guides printed on lighter paper, blue airlines guides and VIP guides sent by company management to Prime Ministers, with gold lettering and leather binding. Some editions included “accessories”, such as bookmarks, envelopes containing a questionnaire, a paper strip surrounding the guide (“1,600 choice tables… and of impartial choice” or “The guide of reasonable addictions”, in 1936 and 1957, respectively), or advertisements for now-forgotten vehicle brands (Delaugère, Ariès, Hotchkiss).
However, some editions are missing due to war: those of 1915 to 1918 and 1940 to 1944 Not to mention the 1921 edition, which was never published due to poor sales in 1920, the year the guide stopped being free.
The foreign editions were not to be outdone, starting with specific covers: green in Switzerland, blue in Germany and England, black in Algeria and Tunisia, and yellow in Spain. The first edition of the Spanish guide, 1910, is one of the most prized; it is estimated that there are around 15 copies worldwide, hence the price of around 9,000 euros.
Some Michelin guide enthusiasts own all or almost all of them, as is the case of Claude de Bruycker, a well-known Belgian figure in the small world of collectors. Juan and Antonio Cancela, two Spanish brothers, have collected almost 1,000 copies, which they present on their website.
Rising prices over the years
Michelin’s management realized that it was sitting on a treasure trove. Hence the recruitment in 2006 of historian Stephane Nicolas, who paved the way for the opening of the Michelin Museum, three years later, at the company’s headquarters in Clermont-Ferrand. Since then, his work has led to the presentation, in dozens of venues, of objects and guides of course, some of which have been digitized to explore their contents.
“This is a very small sample of our collection, stored in 5,000 m2 of reserves,” Nicolas says. Last year, 127,000 curious visitors came through the door of this museum, which has sometimes loaned pieces to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, or to the Charles-de-Gaulle Memorial.
In Paris, when gourmets leave the Michelin-starred Guy Savoy restaurant, they come face to face with one of the famous bouquinistes (book sellers) along the Seine River, Alain Huchet. It’s impossible to miss Huchet’s stand with its big Michelin man. Since 1999, this former chef has been selling only vintage gastronomic books and antique menus.
A complete book collection stored at the bank is worth a total of 120,000 euros, twice the market price.
A few months ago, he sold the “Le Carnet d’Epicure” magazines (1911-1914) by the great Auguste Escoffier, the first chef to be awarded the French Legion of Honor. It includes a section devoted to “recipes from the best houses” (poularde Géraldine from Café Voisin in Paris, sole filet from Romano’s in London). The bill was proportional to the magazine’s rarity : 40,000 euros.
Huchet does business with the biggest names in gastronomy, but also “with small-scale chefs.” And, of course, he sells Michelin guides : “25 euros a copy for books from the 2000s, 35 euros for the 1990s, 40 euros for the 1980s, 50 euros for the 1970s and so on.”
In fact, it’s a steep climb: he has a complete collection stored at the bank, which he says he doesn’t want to part with. But when pressed a little, he estimates the total value at 120,000 euros, almost twice the market price. A price justified by the irreproachable condition of the works, for which he has always been renowned. On his Instagram page, Huchet regularly shares his best finds.
Chefs, the first collectors
Among the great chef collectors are Emmanuel Renaut (Megève), Christophe Bacquié (Luberon), Jean-François Piège (Paris) and Alain Ducasse. There are also younger craftsmen, such as Grégory Masse, pastry chef at “l’Assiette Champenoise” — Arnaud Lallement’s establishment (also a collector), near Reims — who buys guides “every day” for himself or for other chefs, even abroad.
Paul Bocuse (1926-2018), wasn’t a collector, but the man who got chefs out of their kitchens was a marketing genius. In 1995 and 2005, to celebrate the 30th and 40th anniversaries, respectively, of his restaurant’s three stars, he published a special Michelin guide for his guests, accompanied by a small book full of anecdotes.
To make up for not being invited to eat the “Maine Médina lobster”, the Angus prime rib on a spit and the vanilla-pistachio ice cream bombe served on that occasion, you can purchase these documents. Expect to pay around 1,000 euros for the guide and its little book on eBay.
Counterfeiters in ambush
It’s hardly surprising that the sums generated by the old Michelin guides attract not only speculators, but also counterfeiters. According to Marseille-based collector Didier Caillol, nearly a dozen people are active on eBay and other online marketplaces, making the guides look in good condition.
“They put pages back inside, make collages, patch up holes, use wax to shine up editions yellowed by time,” Caillol says. An untrained eye can be tricked by facsimiles, as with the famous 1900 guide, which was reissued in 1989 and 2000. The expert, on the other hand, will recognize in a fraction of a second that these are glued spines and not little notebooks sewn together.
In the digital age, what is the future of the good old red guide ? “For the past four or five years, the number of paper editions has been declining. Some have disappeared, such as in Belgium and Switzerland,” laments Etienne Houdoy, cofounder of the ACGCM. This all makes the object even rarer. And even more so since Michelin no longer prints its guides, but a subsidiary in which the group is not the majority shareholder. So let’s hope the adventure lasts another century!
