Michael Lothar Wolf, the Managing Director of Lothar A. Wolf Spezialmaschinen, sits down with our Editor, Roshini Bains, to describe its new machine that it will exhibit at ProSweets 2022.
Michael Lothar Wolf is the fourth generation Managing Director and majority shareholder of Lothar A. Wolf Spezialmaschinen. Having been active in the company for 34 years, and with a lifetime of experience in the confectionery sector, now, his sons Maurice, Marlon and Marvin will be the next generation working their way into the business. Lothar A. Wolf Spezialmaschinen, founded in 1930, is a company that deals in the designing and building of machines for the processing of chocolate. The company takes into consideration the specific customer requirements can be applied into the machine construction process. Michael Lothar Wolf sits down with International Confectionery to unravel the company’s history, success and new developments that will be showcased at ProSweets 2022.
- Tell me a little about the history of Wolf Spezialmaschinen.
Founded more than 90 years ago, the company has a lot of history to tell.
Lothar A. Wolf Spezialmaschinen has been family-owned for almost a century and is known for the development and sale of new and used machines for the confectionery industry, as well as for its outstanding belt coating technology.
My great-grandfather Arno Rudolf Wolf worked as an engineer at the J. M. Lehmann machine factory in Dresden, the largest chocolate machine manufacturer in the world at the time but was unable to advance further and later moved to Elitewerke AG in Nossen/Saxony as a board member. When the company was hardly able to sell any new machines due to the crisis in 1929, he seized the opportunity to take over the partial operation of Elitewerke AG in Nossen with 60 employees and invented out of necessity the business model that is still valid today.
Arno R. Wolf Maschinen-bauanstalt continued to manufacture new special machines and plants, not only for the cocoa and chocolate industry, but also for the soap, chemical, paint and food industries, and offered planning, assembly, repairs, expert opinions and consulting. Especially the offer of used, “repaired” machines ensured survival during the world economic crisis. After the war, the family found a new home in Bad Salzuflen, and in 1960 the development and manufacture of new machines began again (also in cooperation with a well-known manufacturer). Thus, we have been building machines for chocolate production for over 90 years.
In 2010, we built a new administration and production facility here in Bad Salzuflen-Holzhausen on 7,000 square metres with modern equipment such as cargo cranes for the maintenance of conches weighing several tonnes and the manufacture of our Coatmaster. We have also installed a laboratory where we can test our machines with the customer’s product in order to guarantee optimal results in advance.
Our range of services also includes the repair and reconditioning of used machines, stocktaking of machines and plants for valuation purposes as well as the brokerage and sale of machines and plants from site.
2. How has the pandemic impacted the production and creation of your new machines?
All in all, we have come through the crisis well so far. In the previous year it helped us a lot that we are broadly positioned and can thus act in a diversified manner. In 2020 the focus was initially more on the used machinery business. We sensed that companies were unsettled at the beginning of the crisis and held back on new purchases. But when orders from food retailers did not stop, but even increased, the manufacturers had to increase their capacities at short notice. To this end, they stocked up on used and reconditioned machines since these are of course available very quickly.
Read the full article in our January issue
Media contact
Roshini Bains,
Editor, International Confectionery
Tel: +44 (0) 1622 823 922
Email: editor@in-confectionery.com
