Bismark, 1921

Steinicke was founded in 1921 by Johannes Steinicke in Bismark. It all began with the drying and processing of beet leaves and vegetables for animal feed.

After the Second World War, the Steinicke family fled to the south of Germany and found a new home in Schwaig in Bavaria. In 1958, the family built a new drying facility there. At that time the cultivation of medicinal herbs, parsley and peppermint was also started in cooperation with the Weihenstefan University of Applied Sciences.  

Planning for Munich Airport began in 1968. The state government ordered a construction freeze, which made it impossible for the Steinicke family to expand their business. In addition, the contract farmers sold their land to the airport company on good terms, so that suddenly there was no longer enough agricultural land available. A new location had to be found.

The decision was made in favour of the small town of Luechow in Lower Saxony, near the former border with the GDR. In 1975, construction began on the new Luechow site, which is now the company‘s headquarters. The first drying process took place just one year later. The Luechow plant was handed over by the third generation of owners, Sibylle and Georg Lettenbichler, to their two sons and current managing directors Robert and Michael Lettenbichler in 2022.

Sites and history

In 1991, shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the owner family was able to obtain the return of the land and buildings in Bismark. The business, which had been run down in the GDR, was rebuilt. Today, some of the goods cultivated and dried in Luechow are once again ground into powder or processed into granules in Bismark.

In 2016, the opportunity arose to take over an existing drying plant for culinary herbs in Hayna, near the French border, from the Metz family. Similar to Luechow, the herbs in Hayna are grown in the immediate vicinity of the drying plant.