Rowenta
Rowenta has been a brand name for kitchen and household appliances since 1909 and has belonged to the global French Groupe SEB since 1988 . The German subsidiary is Rowenta Werke GmbH in Erbach in the Odenwald district in Hesse .
history
1884 to 1945
Robert Weintraud founded Weintraud & Comp in 1884 with his two partners Heyne and Aulmann . in Offenbach am Main to manufacture belt buckles and fittings for the local leather industry.
In 1909 the company was in Weintraud & Co. GmbH and renamed the brand name Rowenta based on the name of the founder ( Ro bert We i nt r a ud) logged. Rowenta applied for brand name protection for electrical heating, cooking and warming appliances and other products as early as 1913. The production of toasters or bread toasters of the type E 5003, which looked very similar to the Simplex T-211 from AEG and was one of the first toasters in Germany, began in 1915. In the early 1920s, Rowenta produced additional luxury electrical appliances for the first time. These included irons , coffee makers, and kettles . The catering coffee machines also quickly became bestsellers. During the Second World War , the Rowenta plant in Offenbacher Waldstrasse was almost completely destroyed by allied bomber groups and production came to a standstill.
1946 to 1997
After the end of the war, the factory was rebuilt in the same location and production of hotplates and irons started. In 1948 the production of lighters began and a year later the first iron with temperature control and thermostat could be introduced. The famous snip men's lighter was first produced in 1952. The best-selling automatic ironing machine in Germany in the 1960s, the Federleicht , was also manufactured by Rowenta. The subsidiary in Erbach im Odenwald was founded in 1959.
In 1963, the US company Sunbeam Corporation , based in Chicago , USA, acquired the family business and soon after founded the Rowenta France branch . In the same year, the men lighter won the New York Museum of Modern Art award. Further branches and subsidiaries were established: Rowenta Austria (Austria) 1967, Rowenta Italia (Italy) 1973, Rowenta UK (Great Britain) 1976, Rowenta Netherlands (Netherlands) 1976 and Rowenta Belgium (Belgium) 1980.
In 1982 the parent company Sunbeam Corporation was taken over by Allegheny International based in Pittsburgh , USA. The lighters division (including advertising material) was also handed over to Gebr. Heinemann KG , Hamburg, in 1982 as part of a license agreement . After four years with Allegheny International, Rowenta and its parent company were bought by Chicago Pacific Corporation (later merged into the Maytag group), based in Chicago, and the subsidiary Rowenta USA was founded. Two years later, in 1988, the French Groupe bought SEB Rowenta and integrated it into the group as its own brand. When Gebr. Heinemann KG terminated the contract in 1993, Gerotec GmbH , Buchholz in the Nordheide , took over the license to manufacture lighters.
In 1997 production in Offenbach was stopped. The buildings were demolished and the site expanded into a new industrial park. A street in this industrial park has been named after Rowenta since 2004.
1997 until today
Despite the refreshment of the design of the product range, including new colors, and despite the introduction of the Infinium RS 921 vacuum cleaner , which works without dust bags, as well as the fact that Rowenta employed 1,200 people worldwide in 2004 and generated a turnover of 120 million euros, there was a crisis it in 2005 in the company. 215 of the 575 employees at the Erbach plant in the Odenwald were laid off. Half of the production of two million irons in the lowest price category is to be outsourced to the People's Republic of China in the future. The management under Olivier Naccache and the owner Groupe SEB have quality control as well as the development and production of high-quality irons carried out in Erbach.
In 2006 the turnover achieved by 335 employees was 53.8 million euros. Up to 35% of sales were achieved in the USA, 55% in Europe and around 10% in Asia. The plant was able to produce 200,000 more irons a year than before the job cuts the previous year. In 2007 the Federal Cartel Office imposed fines of more than 1.4 million euros on household appliance manufacturers Krups and SEB Deutschland (Rowenta, Tefal ) for inadmissible price manipulation. The companies tried to enforce minimum prices on the market for some of their products and to do so to exert considerable economic pressure on the dealers.
In 2009, 119 of the 290 employees at the Erbach iron works were laid off. At the end of the year, 181 people were employed in Erbach. At the Pont-Evêque site, 95 more jobs should also be lost.
In 2013, the iron range consisted of six basic iron models. From this 40 to 50 variants are derived, which were produced in lots of 5,000 copies. The company headed by Jochen Weber produced 3,000 irons per day in two shifts in 2013, around 1.7 million per year. The Erbach production facility is one of the most modern iron factories in Europe. Rowenta conducts research particularly in the area of soleplate technology. The Rowentian of the Year is awarded annually .
Various household appliances are currently offered under the Rowenta name, in particular:
- Steam irons, steam generators, steam brushes, travel irons, ironing tables
- Hair straighteners, styling devices, hot air brushes, hair dryers, hair / beard trimmers, epilators, lady shavers
- Cylinder vacuum cleaners with and without a bag, corded and cordless stick vacuum cleaners, hand vacuum cleaners
- Coffee machines, kettles, toasters
- Air purifiers, fan heaters, fans.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Groupe SEB - History >> 1988 ( English ) SEB Développement SAS . Retrieved November 16, 2015.
- ↑ Cheap irons from Rowenta will in future come from China . Handelsblatt GmbH. Retrieved November 18, 2014.
- ↑ 50 years under steam . Hessian radio. Retrieved November 18, 2014.
- ↑ Home appliance manufacturers should pay a fine of millions . Handelsblatt GmbH. Retrieved May 2, 2016.
- ^ Home appliances from Hessen: Hot irons made in Germany . VDI Verlag GmbH. Retrieved November 18, 2014.
- ↑ Rowenta continues to evacuate personnel . Frankfurter Rundschau GmbH. Retrieved May 16, 2016.
- ↑ A rough sole gives iron steam . Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung GmbH. Retrieved November 18, 2014.
- ^ Official Rowenta website . Groupe SEB Germany GmbH. Retrieved November 18, 2014.