Andre Michelin was born in 1853, After finishing his engineering degree at the Paris Central School in 1877, he entered art school as an architecture student. He later spent five years in the cartography department of the Ministry of the Interior, then set up a metal framework business in Paris.

His brother, Edouard Michelin, was, born in 1859. He studied at the Paris School of Art. In 1889, he left his arts career to manage a company founded by his grandfather, Aristide Barbier, and his cousin Nicolas Edouard Daubree. The company had been founded in 1832 as a farm machinery and pump manufacturing business. They soon became interested in the industrial possibilities of vulcanized rubber, which they used in their factory for seals, belts, calves, and pipes.

When Edouard Michelin became manager of the company, assisted by his older brother, he changed its name to the Michelin Company.

The popular mascot, the Michelin Man, was also created by the Michelin brothers. During a visit to the 1894 International Fair in Lyon, they found themselves in front of a stack of tires. The shape of the stack reminded them of a man, and thus the mascot was born. The Michelin Man's name is Bidenbum, by the way, and the first Bidenbum was drawn by a poster artist named O'Galop in 1898.