LOWA History

Lorenz Wagner, the son of shoemaker Johann Wagner, founded the LOWA company in the tranquil town of Jetzendorf, north of Munich, in 1923.

He spent days and months developing lasts, models and soles. His work laid the foundation for the company's future success.

However, the company's 100-year history was not only characterised by rosy times. In the 1950s in particular, LOWA had to contend with major challenges, which Sepp and Berti Lederer, Lorenz Wagner's daughter, successfully mastered.

A new era finally began in the early 1990s. It heralded a turning point and made LOWA what it is today: one of the most important outdoor shoe manufacturers in the world.

Lorenz later described how he used music to lay the foundations for setting up his cobbler's workshop:

"Back then, it was customary for a country cobbler to also be a musician. I played at weddings and other events, earning myself a tidy sum of money and initially acquiring the most essential machines."

- Lorenz Wagner | LOWA

WITHIN A RADIUS OF 10 KILOMETRES

There was a great need for shoes in the 1920s, as they were the most important means of transport. People in both rural and urban areas primarily travelled on foot. Lorenz's brothers set up as independent shoemakers. Hans Wagner went to Vierkirchen, his brother Adolf to Weichs, both places are about 10 kilometres away from Jetzendorf. The band disbanded and the history of the three shoe brands began.

Today's Hanwag brand was founded in 1921. Hans Wagner supplied shoes for a Munich company and soon produced his own waistband and Haferl shoes. He constantly expanded his business and marketed his shoes under the name Hanwag from 1952. The factory remained in the family for the first 83 years, with the company founder being succeeded by his nephew Josef Wagner, meaning that Hanwag only had two company directors during this time. Since 2004, the company has belonged to Fenix Outdoor AB. The "brother company" is still a friendly rival of LOWA today.

Adolf Wagner, the youngest of the three brothers, married in Weichs in 1923, took over the shoe repair workshop there and developed it into a shoe factory with 30 employees within ten years. His mountain and ski boots were very successful under the abbreviation "A.W.". Like his brothers, he also produced mountain infantry boots during the war. In the post-war period, a new start was made under the brand name Hochland. Daughter Emma and her husband took over the business in 1955, which was known worldwide in the 1950s and 1960s. In the mid-1970s, the shoe factory was leased to the company Romika, which produced high-quality hiking boots there. However, the competitive pressure was too great and the factory had to close for good in 1981.

THE "ILMTAL SPORTS SHOE FACTORY"

The parallels to the stories of his brothers cannot be overlooked: Lorenz Wagner, born in 1893, was the eldest son and took over his parents' estate in Jetzendorf in 1922. This included some land and his father Johann's country cobbler's shop. Lorenz had big plans: together with his wife Therese, he wanted to expand the "small farm cobbler's workshop" into a proper "business". So he bought his first machines and founded his own company in 1923, which was not yet called LOWA. He probably ran it simply under his own name at first; in the 1930s, the company appears in documents as "Ilmtaler Sportschuhfabrik". Success followed: in 1925 Lorenz Wagner employed two male workers over the age of 16, by 1930 there were already seven employees - six men and one woman. The premises became too small. The first factory building was built, measuring 15 by 6 metres.

From February 1930, a capable apprentice by the name of Josef Lederer joined the company. He told us later:

"The shoemakers were housed in the attic, and I was also there as an apprentice. Everyone - including those who lived in the village - was catered for in the house. The food was part of the wages. As an apprentice, you had to pay an apprenticeship fee - in return, I was allowed to shine my future wife's shoes."

- Sepp Lederer | LOWA

Did he realise it at the time? At the end of his apprenticeship, Josef Lederer left LOWA, but returned over 15 years later and married Berti Wagner, the daughter of the company founder.

In the early days of LOWA, the company primarily produced oat shoes made of leather. Soon, however, the factory was also producing "sports shoes", i.e. mountain and ski boots. These were also made of leather. In the "golden twenties", alpine sports experienced a boom, which benefited shoemakers such as Lorenz, Hans and Adolf Wagner.

THE COMPANY IN DIFFICULTIES

At the beginning of the 1950s, there was little material and little money available. The Korean crisis exacerbated this development. Leather, an important raw material for LOWA, became scarce and was traded at very high prices. Lorenz Wagner bought leather on a large scale.

Sepp Lederer later explained Wagner's purchase decision in an interview: "Some capable businessmen took advantage of this and said: Buy, buy! - it's only going to get more expensive! Six months later, the Korean spook was over - and leather prices plummeted. that was 1950/51, and one day we couldn't get any more money from the savings bank to pay our wages." - LOWA was on the verge of bankruptcy.

A plan was needed to save the shoe factory and fortunately Lorenz Wagner already had the right man and the right woman in the company. His daughter Berta (Berti) Wagner was now the commercial director of LOWA. In addition, Sepp Lederer, who had only recently returned from being a prisoner of war, was working as operations manager in the shoe factory. Sepp Lederer Lederer had actually planned to stay for "just one year". But in the financial crisis, he no longer wanted or was able to leave. Together with his future wife, he took over responsibility for the company. The creditors advised LOWA to make a settlement, but Sepp and Berti managed to negotiate a moratorium with them, i.e. a deferral of the repayments.

It was an exhausting time. Berti Lederer later described how insolvency threatened anew every month and had to be averted. But they managed to overcome the challenges together - and brought Berti and Sepp closer together. They married on 5 July 1952, and Lorenz Wagner experienced these dramatic events in the last year of his life. He died in 1953 at the age of 60. LOWA was not yet out of the woods.

Berti Lederer recalled decades later: "When my father died in April 1953, I was heavily pregnant. Sepp and I walked behind the coffin towards the cemetery and we were overwhelmed by the sympathy we received from Jetzendorf. Sepp spontaneously squeezed my arm and said, looking at all the LOWA employees who had turned up: 'We can't possibly close the business, that would be the last thing Lorenz would have wanted. We'll carry on!"

THE HISTORY OF A COMPANY STEEPED IN TRADITION

The year of 2023 marks a milestone in LOWA’s history. The shoemaker is celebrating its 100th anniversary. It is the perfect time to look back over the last 100 years and bring the company’s history to life.

ON THE HIGHEST MOUNTAINS IN THE WORLD 

The crisis was finally overcome in the mid-1950s. The son of the company founder, Josef Wagner, now also worked at LOWA, he was responsible for production and shared the management with Sepp Lederer. Berti Lederer was still in charge of sales. Together, the second generation of the family business founded a limited partnership, LOWA KG, in 1957. Sepp Lederer and Josef Wagner acted as personally liable partners, Berti Lederer as a limited partner. LOWA stopped producing street shoes and oatmeal boots and focussed on the production of high-quality mountain and ski boots. The first marketing campaigns were organised, brochures were printed and trade fairs attended. During this time, LOWA also became known for equipping many high mountain expeditions. International mountaineers visited the shoe manufacturer in Jetzendorf, Bavaria, for advice and to order customised shoes. The golden age of "mountain boots and ski boots with a difference" began.

LOWA TREKKER | LOWA SKI BOOT

CHANGE

The third Wagner/Lederer generation was not as successful as its predecessors. Due to a series of wrong business decisions and market changes, LOWA got into financial difficulties. Once again, the banks decided the fate of the company. It was during this time that Werner Riethmann joined LOWA. Riethmann had previously been managing director at Raichle, a Swiss shoe manufacturer. He knew LOWA and the Lederer family. in 1992, the advisory board of Deutsche Bank appointed him as managing director.

The stories about this time of upheaval and change seem adventurous at times. There were mountains of unused material in barns and garages, Werner Riethmann recounts in his interview with contemporary witnesses. For the entire first year, he only "worked from the reserves" and produced shoes with the material. When his one-year contract expired, the sale of LOWA was initiated.

THE ZANATTA FAMILY AND TECNICA

There were several interested parties in the shoe factory, but eventually the Italian company Tecnica prevailed as the buyer. The family company had been founded at a similar time and with similar products to LOWA. It had developed from a small Italian cobbler's workshop in 1930. The current senior member of the family, Giancarlo Zanatta, had already worked in his father's workshop as a teenager. Together with his brother, he then expanded the business into a larger shoe factory for mountain boots, ski boots and après-ski boots. The company's international breakthrough came in 1970 with the invention of Moon Boots. These après-ski boots, reminiscent of the heavy shoes worn by the first men on the moon, are now classics of industrial design and can be found in museums such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

With the purchase of a majority shareholding in LOWA, Tecnica secured an important position within the alpine boot market. Werner Riethmann, who returned to LOWA soon after the sale and thus started a second time at LOWA, so to speak, has also been involved in LOWA since this time. The co-operation between Tecnica and LOWA was under a good star right from the start. One long-standing employee has particularly fond memories of the first joint celebration, the 70th anniversary of LOWA. "That was a great party. The Jetzendorfer Haus- und Hinterhofmusikanten played, which our Italian business partners particularly enjoyed. There were polonaises throughout the hall, old and young, Jetzendorfers and Italians, all together. There was a really good atmosphere."

MORE LOWA, FEWER SKI BOOTS

The employees at LOWA and the municipality of Jetzendorf were still unsure after the sale. What will happen in the long term? Will LOWA stay in Jetzendorf? Will Tecnica change the product range?

The new management team at LOWA soon realised: LOWA will remain an alpine boot factory and LOWA will remain in Jetzendorf. However, the LOWA ski boot division moved to Tecnica in Italy. As the development and production of ski boots is complex, it did not seem to make much sense to operate two ski boot sites in one company group. LOWA ski boots were still manufactured at Tecnica for over ten years. production of the ski boots was discontinued in 2008.

LOWA mountain boots made great strides on the road to success. The motto was: LOWA "... simply more". Restructuring, investments, extensions and technical developments took the company to the next peak: the sale of 1 million pairs of boots in 2000.

A NEW ERA: 100 YEARS OF LOWA

INTO THE WORLD: 80 COUNTRIES


Today, LOWA shoes are exported to 80 countries around the world. Major international mountaineers have been wearing LOWA shoes since the 1950s at the latest. International business began in the 1970s with Switzerland, Austria, the USA and Japan. Each country has its own LOWA history - and its own LOWA collection.