1896
Apolda – heart of the German wool industry
In 1896 no car drove through Apolda, there was no electrical light, no telephone rang, maybe there was a Grammophon playing, and knitware was transported by sailing ships or railway into the outside world. A contemporary encyclopedia states: "Germany’s knitware industry is centred in and around Chemnitz. Woollen goods mainly come from Apolda. Besides, Zeulenroda, Northern Bohemia and from the region around Nuremberg and Erlangen, Kalm, Reutlingen and Berlin."
In 1889 3,800 male and 5,190 female out of a total of the towns 20,600 inhabitants worked in the knitware production and delivered knitware for the whole of Germany. One third of the production output was sent to Europe and America. A lot of firms died and export of knitware into these countries decreased when Northern America, Russia and Spain introduced protective tariffs between 1890 and 1894. Alone the losses caused by losing Spain as an export destination amounted to a total of 5 million Mark, an enormous sum in those days and a heavy loss for Apolda.
In these hard times Emil Moths, a master craftsman, decided to found his own company. After the fast development of the knitware industry at the beginning of the century in Apolda and the installation of electricity in 1902,
Emil Moths erected in 1904 the head office. During the 1920s his wife Anna, his son Rudolf as well as his 4 daughters Wally, Marie, Ilse and Gertrud contributed to the success of the company. Such family run businesses were typical in that time in Apolda where every second house was a knitware production centre.
Around that time, Emil Moths made a ground-breaking invention regarding the further development of lock technology in thread-changing devices which brought about considerable license payments which were put to use in modernizing and extending the company.
In 1972 all private-run businesses in Apolda became nationalised, a fate which the knitware company Emil Moths could not escape. In 1992 after the wall came down, the great- and grand-children of the founder decided to reprivatise the firm and set to work in hard times.
Two years after the privatisation, the entire machinery in operation had been renewed and strickchic counts as one of the best-equipped knitware production centres in Germany.
Strickchic provides an excellent value for money for knitware made entirely in the own house and thus passes on the low work costs in East-Germany to the customer. 50 highly motivated expert from the traditional knitware centre Apolda guarantee quality and reliability.
In 1995 strickchic managed to continue its story of success with an increase in turn-over of more than 20% in opposition to the general trend.
We would like to thank our customers for their trust and appreciation of our top class workmanship. We would also like to thank those who helped us on our first steps of walking the stony paths of the free-market economy, expecially Lucia Lüneburg.
1996, strickchic – one of Germany’s high profile knitware production centres.
