Homeland
We are Rühle
Der Weg zu Rühle ist keine Abkürzung. Er führt an verschiedenen Seen vorbei, den Berg hinauf und wenn man eine bundesweit bekannte Brauerei gesehen hat, ist man fast am Ziel – im kleinen Schwarzwalddorf Grafenhausen.
Von hier kommen Maschinen, die HighTech pur sind. Die Originale von Rühle. Dass die Firma noch immer hier oben zu Hause ist, das hat vor allem mit einer Frau zu tun: Marlene Rühle.
Marlene Rühle
Black Forest or nothing
Her desk is oriented towards the window. If you walked into the room while Marlene Rühle was working, you would only see the back of her head. There is a reason for this. “Just look,” she says, making a sweeping arm movement along the window front. “Should I miss this view and instead look at the door?” The view from the window spans almost 180 degrees. A true Black Forest panorama. From Marlene Rühle’s office, you could photograph glossy posters or postcards. “On clear days, you can see all the way to the Alps,” she says proudly.
Marlene and Willy Rühle founded the company together five decades ago. Her husband, who passed away in 1991, had previously worked for a Swabian machine builder. But at some point, Marlene Rühle gave him an ultimatum: Black Forest or nothing. Willy Rühle made the right decision. The opportunity to trade Grafenhausen for another location came up several times. After their breakthrough, a Bavarian client wanted to lure the company to Munich. There was even a production hall available there.
At one point, they were almost in agreement with a community in South Baden. And after the reunification, there was a lucrative offer from East Germany. The plot in Plauen was already marked out, and the economic development engine almost absorbed Rühle as well. But not with Marlene Rühle. In case of doubt, she was the deciding factor. Her word made the difference. “We are staying here,” she said. “Here is our home.”
Marlene Rühle’s parental home stands a few hundred meters from the current company headquarters. It was built in 1665. Almost exactly 300 years later – in 1962 – Willy Rühle began inventing machines here. He built them differently from anything else on the market at that time. “Our first machine was a cutting machine mainly for ham and bacon,” recalls Marlene Rühle.
In the predecessor models of other manufacturers, the rind was still inserted vertically. “That was not nice,” says Marlene Rühle. The cut slices were crushed under the weight of the meat. Willy Rühle was the first to store the meat horizontally and thus managed to build an automatic machine that cut more cleanly than a butcher with a freshly sharpened knife.
Willy Rühle was the first to store the meat horizontally, which allowed him to build an automatic machine that cuts more cleanly than a butcher with a freshly sharpened knife.
The three children, Sabine, Claus, and Jörg, were born two years apart starting in 1964. Marlene Rühle demonstrated how to balance career and family long before the country talked about childcare, flexible working hours, or work/life balance. At the Rühles’, sleeves were rolled up. Yet, the good atmosphere did not suffer: “Our first apprentice, who started here in 1966, is still with the company,” Marlene Rühle says. He is also a true Black Forest original. A Rühle, indeed.
Willy Rühle recognized early on that it wasn’t enough to build machines like others and then offer them in a new color. He developed ideas, introduced new techniques, and eventually had to ask himself how to prevent being copied by others. The answer remains: high performance. The Rühles always aimed to stay one step ahead of their competitors.
After Willy Rühle’s death, what the couple had always wished for was completed: Marlene Rühle built a new factory in the Black Forest, on a green field in Grafenhausen. There was little time for mourning. The plans were in place, and the construction took just nine months. Then they moved to the new location.
Today, everything is under one roof – development, production, assembly, and administration. About 160 employees work here. In the early 2000s, the facility was even expanded by another 1300 square meters. By then, Rühle, the small company that had struggled to survive in its early years, had long since become an economic backbone of the Upper Black Forest. Medium-sized companies like Rühle – owner-managed, family-oriented, inventive – are becoming increasingly rare in the villages around the Feldberg.
The successful succession at Rühle is also thanks to Claus Rühle. He joined the management in 1999, taking over his father’s role, becoming a tinkerer and visionary, ensuring that Rühle’s technology remains distinctive. Claus Rühle is an original Black Forest native – just like his mother, just like the company that bears their name, and just like the machines built here in Grafenhausen. All genuine originals. That’s the only way it works.
The Rühle Story
Claus Rühle, one of the couple’s three children, earned his first stripes in the business in the early 1990s. In 1999, he became the managing director. The following year, Marlene Rühle officially handed over the company to him. However, she remained active at the helm of Rühle until 2013. Today, the company from Grafenhausen in the district of Waldshut employs around 160 people.