A word from the CEO

How it all started

On 1 June 1956, Hans Spichtig, together with the then plant manager Josef Weber, bought into a small existing plastics pressing plant in the centre of Steinen, Schwyz, thus laying the foundation stone for the company Spichtig & Co.
After a short time, it gets clear that the pressing of plastic parts was no longer in keeping with the times. From a liquidation, a small injection moulding machine was taken over.
Soon the number of orders from customers increased and the premises in the village became too small. Incoming order volumes increased rapidly and the company soon outgrew its premises in the village. At the start of the 1960s, Hans was able to purchase a plot of land outside the village, where he constructed his first factory building.

Milestone

In the mid-1960s, he commissioned designer Benedikt Rohner to develop a storage system that would make optimum use of the available space inside a cabinet. Rohner devised a storage system that is still widely used today. The next challenge was to come up with a suitable name for the product. After much deliberation, the pair opted for styro (with «s» standing for Spichtig, «ty» from the French tiroir, meaning drawer, and «ro» for Rohner): a name that is now used for all storage products that we manufacture inhouse.

Although styro ag has in the meantime mostly produced its own products, the spraying of customer orders is still an important mainstay for us today.

Change in management

In 1997 Stefan Spichtig took over the management of the company from his father. He quickly realised that the demand for filing systems was declining and therefore decided to supplement our self-manufactured products with our own private labels. This was done on the one hand from 2003 with lights and office products such as foot rests, telephone swivel arms, etc. which we sell under the name Hansa, and on the other hand with everyday office products such as display bags, writing cases, picture frames, etc. which we have been offering under the name dufco since 2009.

There are things in life that cannot be planned in advance and so it was incomprehensible to all employees when they received the news that my husband, Stefan Spichtig, passed away unexpectedly at the age of only 50 on 10 September 2011.

It was clear to me that the company must be continued in order to secure jobs. So the company was temporarily managed by an external CEO until I had acquired the necessary know-how to take over the management myself on May 1, 2015.

Values

I am grateful to be able to continue to run this company with its great and motivated employees. It is important to me to continue manufacturing our styro products here in Switzerland. Flexibility, experienced employees, close contact with our customers, Swiss quality and the preservation of jobs are central to me.

My thanks also go to you, dear customers, partners and suppliers, for your loyalty. We look forward to continuing our interesting and pleasant cooperation with you.

 

Annemarie Spichtig-Engeler