The potting machine turns 50

It was in 1967 that Georg Mayer developed the world's first potting machine with an automatic drill motor. The company still has many innovations and new ideas for the coming 50 years. Mayer GmbH & Co. KG - a name now synonymous with top quality horticultural machinery - is looking to the future with optimism. Klaus Mayer, son of the inventor of the potting machine, has been managing the firm for some 25 years and represents the fifth generation of his family to do so.

It was thanks to two committed plant cultivators 50 years ago that the metal worker and mechanic Georg (known to his friends as 'Schorsch' Mayer) decided to develop a method for the automatic potting of plants. At that time, all pots had been manually filled with soil and plants prior to sale and the growing demand for pot plants meant that it had become necessary to develop a machine that could do the work. Potting by hand was not only an exhausting task - it was simply not fast enough to keep pace with market needs. Georg Mayer tinkered on various systems for a while before finally unveiling his automatic potting machine with drill under the name of 'planter'. This was the beginning of a worldwide success story - and time has not stood still in the interim in Heidenheim, where Mayer GmbH & Co. KG is based.

"Of course, I wasn't involved back then," reminisces Klaus Mayer, the son of the inventor, with a smile. As managing director of the Mayer Group, he has been systematically extending the business over the past decades, placing an early focus on international growth. Horticultural machinery is just one of the five business sectors in which the Mayer Group is currently active. The spin-off Mayer Holding offers solutions in connection with steel and equipment engineering, laser sheet metal technology and hardware and software for control and handling technology.

In 2017, Mayer has come to consider itself a "well-structured, mid-sized business".
At the commencement of its anniversary year, a new strategic alignment of the Mayer Group has been clearly defined by its new CEO, Steven Anderson, which, among other things, will involve an expansion of personnel numbers.

Innovations at the 2018 IPM
The 50th birthday of the potting machine is not simply a date on the calendar for the management team in Heidenheim headquarters - they will also be celebrating the event with customers, partners and others.

Mayer is planning to showcase more of its innovations in late January 2018 at the world's leading trade fair for horticulture - the International Plant Fair (IPM) in Essen. Even after 50 years, Mayer's designers and developers are still full of fresh ideas.

For more information:
Mayer
Poststraße 30
89522 Heidenheim
Germany
T: +49 7321 9594 290
F: +49 7321 9594 299
info@mayer.de
mayer.de