Wanzl GmbH & Co. KGaA is the world's largest manufacturer of shopping trolleys and luggage trolleys. The company, which has its headquarters in Leipheim, Germany, has approximately 5,000 employees in 12 plants in 8 countries and over 27 sales offices (2018 figures). Annual production totalled approximately 2.0 million shopping trolleys. In 1918, Rudolf Wanzl Senior founded a locksmith's in Giebau in the Sudetenland (today part of the Czech Republic), which he built up into a scale manufacturing business and agricultural machinery company with 20 employees. After the expulsion of Germans from the region in 1947, Rudolf Wanzl Junior re-established the company in Leipheim as a scale manufacturer and repair workshop. The inspiration to focus on the concept of self-service came from the cash register manufacturer NCR in Augsburg. The company ordered hand-made shopping baskets for its demonstration room. At around the same time, the "Production" consumer co-operative, based in Hamburg, ordered 40 trolleys and 100 hand baskets for the opening of Germany's first self-service shop. At the start of the 1950s, Rudolf Wanzl travelled to the United States where he met Sylvan Goldman, inventor of the shopping trolley. On the return flight he had already designed his own more manoeuvrable version, which became the model for all shopping trolleys in use today. In 1951, the first shopping trolley with a fixed basket was patented. Three years later, the co-owning Siegel brothers left the company to found their own business. This is how it came about that Germany's two largest shopping trolley manufacturers were both based in Leipheim for many years. By 1956, Wanzl had 74 employees. More information...
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