Company 
Company biography of Schaffitzel

1888 Master smith Johann Philipp Schaffitzel moved from Weikersheim to Obersontheim and acquired a hammer mill.
Soon he was forced by growing business competition and industrial development to lay aside his hammer. By setting up sawing machines in his building he laid the cornerstone of a small saw mill. As before, the fast-flowing river Bühler made the driven wheel running.


1905 the founder died and his sons Wilhelm and Friedrich continued the business. Gottlob, the youngest son, made a saw mill training and was a student at a commercial college. For some time he explored new worlds and factories.


1910 There was the opportunity to acquire a small saw mill in Sulzdorf. Wilhelm and Friedrich accepted their brother Gottlob as partner, who took over the Sulzdorf saw mill.


1928 He separated from his brothers and continued running the mill under his name.

In the thirties the old saw mill was abandonned and a new bigger one was built.
New sawing machines, extraction systems for saw dust and strands, modern drying chambers were installed. By using wooden litter in a steam engine the whole factory was powered by steam-power.

The nearby railway station in Sulzdorf was used for the transportation of timber by waggons into the Rhine-Ruhr district.
New markets were sought and timber storehouses in Künzelsau and Weinheim were erected.During the second world war heavy throwbacks disrupted the activities of the saw mill.


1946 During the reconstruction phase of Sulzdorf which was nearly burnt to the ground a carpentry and a joinery were installed on the factory grounds.


1948 Son Helmut G. Schaffitzel, a construction engineer who had finished his studies in 1948, started to focus on the development of these new branches of industry. He reformed the former carpentry towards a modern timber construction branch which soon turned out to become one of the first glue laminated timber production in Germany. Also the joinery was changed into a modern production plant for built-in kittchen.


1950 Son Kurt Schaffitzel – in 1947a prisoner of war returnee - joined the management in 1950 after several years of training. He assumed control of the saw and planing mill and the timber trade.
Saw and planing mill were again modernized, trade connections, which had been disrupted by war and postwar incidents, were re-activated and new ones were established.

In the sixties Kurt Schaffitzel also assumed control of the glue laminated timber production and Helmut Schaffitzel focussed on the further development of the built-in kittchen production.


1967 As of 1967 the former company’s name was changed into SCHAFFITZEL Holzindustrie GmbH + Co.


1970 This new enterprise could set into operation a fully automated production line for producing glue laminated timber.


1983 Jürgen Gottlob Schaffitzel joined the parental enterprise as production manager, after having completed his studies at the Fachhochschule Biberach/Riß as construction engineer and after having worked as construction engineer for the Kirschner Group in Dülmen.


1989 He was appointed chief executive officer and since 1995 he has been appointed managing partner of Schaffitzel Holzindustrie.

Glue laminated timber – a symbol of reliability in industrialized building – has a wide range of application forms. A minimum of net weight, high carrying capacity of components, variability of architectural design, easy maintenance and, last but not least, a positive fire behaviour of glue laminated timber represent exceptional advantages in modern construction technique.


Today To this day glue laminated timber is produced in the Schaffitzel Holzleimbauwerk for widely stretched buildings as industrial halls, production halls, sport halls, market halls, indoor swimming pools, churches or other ecclesiastical buildings as well as residential building, bridge building and pedestrian bridges.

This enterprise is well-established on the national market, its production is certified by the quality mark “Gütezeichen Holzleimbau” and is member of the Studiengemeinschaft Holzleimbau e.V.