Laabs GmbH

Laabs GmbH
legal form	GmbH
founding	1913
Seat	Holzminden , Germany
management	Herbert Laabs Marcus Laabs
Number of employees	30th
Website	www.laabs-gmbh.de

The Laabs GmbH , is a German average family for plastic recycling , based in Lower Saxony Holzminden . The company became known through its third largest series furniture production in Germany in the former Gollnow and the world-famous brands WILAGO and WLG. The managing directors are Herbert Laabs (* 1934) and since 2011 Marcus Laabs (* 1968).

history

Gollnow

The furniture company was founded on August 2, 1913 in Gollnow (today: Goleniów ) in the Naugard district by the carpenter Willi Laabs (* 1888; † June 13, 1945). Demand increased and Laabs bought a piece of land near the Gollnow train station for 32,000 Reichsmarks and began building the first factory building. The brand names WILAGO ( Wi lli La abs Go llnow) and WLG were established . In 1924, a large building complex was bought for 200,000 Reichsmarks and the plant was given a siding. The craft business had become an industrial enterprise. From 1925 to 1928, more machines were purchased and Laabs was the first in Germany to introduce assembly line production into furniture production. In 1930, smaller pieces of furniture were also added to the range, especially desks and men's rooms made of solid wood, as well as bookcases, tables and dining rooms in solid, heavy design. A massive desk with decorations cost around 80 Reichsmarks at the time. In 1931, WILAGO also offered furniture in oak , mahogany and in the then new and modern shade of Caucasian walnut polished. In line with the entrepreneur's philosophy, he planned to produce everything from a single source, from the tree trunk to the finished product. In 1927, for example, Laabs acquired a huge manor in Jacobsdorf with 2,000 hectares of arable land and 2,000 hectares of forest from the von Flügge family . There was also a sawmill, a plywood factory and a veneer factory and in 1932 the company covered an area of ​​60,000 m². By participating as an exhibitor at the Leipzig furniture fair, WILAGO also won international customers and made the brand, which was already widespread in Germany, known abroad. In 1933 400 people were employed and the company achieved sales of around 3 million Reichsmarks. During the Second World War , part of the plant was confiscated by the Wehrmacht and expanded under the cover name Montagewerk Meißen for the final assembly of the cruise missile Fieseler Fi 103R (also known as V1) with a focus on the Reichenberg bomb (as a planned manned version) for the Kampfgeschwader 200 . By the end of the war, WILAGO employed around 1,000 people on an area of ​​197,000 m² and also produced ready-made makeshift homes for the German Housing Fund . In the spring of 1945, Gollnow was also conquered by the Red Army and subsequently divided by establishing the German-Polish border along the Oder-Neisse line . Poland took over the administration in 1945 and the German population from their homes sold . While fleeing via Miedzyzdroje to the island of Wollin (today: Wolin ) and after the Soviet conquest on May 6, 1945, the company founder Willi Laabs died on June 13, 1945 and was buried anonymously in Miedzyzdroje (today: Międzyzdroje ). One year after the end of the war, his widow Paula Laabs was expelled from her home country in June 1946 and fled to the West with her seven children. In autumn 1949 the family came to Holzminden in southern Lower Saxony via many detours . The abandoned furniture company was confiscated and the machines dismantled and taken to the Soviet Union. It was not until 1963 that the Poles began producing furniture in the Lapsa combine at the old WILAGO site . The combine was later renamed GFM (Goleniowski Fabryki Mebli) . At the beginning of the 1990s, Laabs was offered the takeover of GFM, which, however, refused. In 1997 it was taken over by Steinhoff International Holdings . In 2006 the company Optical Disc Service (ODS) from Dassow took over the former production facilities of WILAGO and expanded them to the production of DVDs. ODS went bankrupt in 2007 and in 2008 it was taken over by the Spanish Ibermediagroup (Iberdisc).

Holzminden

In 1954, WILAGO started over in Holzminden and the company was re-founded by the two oldest sons, Bernd Laabs and Herbert Laabs. In the early days, mattresses were initially knotted and some small pieces of furniture (flower stools or tea trolleys) were produced again. At the end of the 1960s the company had around 100 employees. In 1972, plastics recycling was added as a new pillar of the company, with a focus on polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and ABS plastic . In 1995, Bernd Laabs KG was renamed today's Laabs GmbH.

In 2012, Laabs GmbH achieved a turnover of 4 million euros with around 30 employees and processes around 8,000 tons of PVC annually.

brand names

The historical brand names Wilago and WLG (most recently registered as a word and figurative mark with the German Patent and Trademark Office (DPMA) for goods and services of class (es) 20) reached their end of protection date in 2010.

Trivia

At the end of the 1930s, the company's founder Willi Laabs owned four Maybach luxury automobiles, including a Maybach Zeppelin DS 7 in a special six-seater convertible version acquired in 1931 , two Maybach SW 38, a Maybach SW 35, two Horch automobiles and a Stoewer Gigant type G 15 . The DS 7 was converted into a limousine by the coachbuilder Hermann Spohn in Ravensburg at the end of the 1940s and confiscated by the French after the Second World War. A Maybach owned by Willi Laabs was confiscated by the Wehrmacht and later served as a parade vehicle for Field Marshal Erwin Rommel in the Balkans and was later destroyed in Belgrade. A leather-covered wooden case, which is part of the standard equipment of the Maybach DS 7, was taken along by the Laabs family at the end of the war, along with other vital items and 6,000 ampoules to fight typhus . When typhus broke out on the island of Wolin and with the ampoules, the family and other people were able to survive. A Dr. By administering the serum, Pelling prevented an epidemic and later smuggled the Maybach suitcase through the Soviet controls and later handed the memento to the family in Holzminden. Mercedes presented the case and its history along with numerous documents at the Geneva Motor Show in 2002 for the renaissance of the Maybach brand.

literature

• Clemens Range: From Gollnow to Holzminden. A company through the ages, Müllheim-Britzingen, Translimes 2010
• INSIDE Wohn-Markt-Magazin, issue no.537 from April 10, 1997
• Möbel Kultur - magazine for the furniture business, June 1997 issue

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Federal Gazette : Annual financial statements for the financial year from January 1, 2013 to December 31, 2013
2. ↑ http://www.pbesgen.de/jakobsdorf.html
3. ↑ Olaf Przybilski: The secret of German rockets and rocket- propelled aircraft, Volume 10, Podzun-Pallas, 2002, ISBN 3790907634
4. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original dated February 1, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
5. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from May 26, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
6. ↑ http://www.dtoday.de/regionen/lokal-politik_artikel,-Vom-Teewagen-zum-Rohstoff-Hersteller-_arid,207517.html

Web links

Laabs GmbH website