Unlimited sleeping comfort

Unfortunately, attempts to extend this success into the home countries of these new partners were unsuccessful at the time. An attempt to sell hotel beds to Great Britain, for instance, failed due to the high price of iron in Germany. However, as hospital beds became increasingly important in the Stiegelmeyer portfolio in the 1950s and 60s, global demand also revived. The “Stiegelmeyer-Mitteilungen” publication proudly listed the countries and continents of our customers: Holland, Belgium, France, South America, and the Middle East. Prominent customers included the Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, where the world’s first heart transplant was performed in 1967, and the new hospital in Tenerife.

The Stiegelmeyer Group regularly delivered products to various African regions, whose special requirements were vividly described in our customer magazine. In some parts of Western Africa, there were no harbours to cater for large cargo ships at the time. The beds were transferred to so-called “surf boats” just off the coast and carried the last few metres to the beach through the surf.

In the Kenyan capital Nairobi in 1960, our adjustable hospital beds were so highly regarded that the East African Standard newspaper reported enthusiastically: “The only movement the bed cannot make is to stand on its head. Otherwise, the bed seems to be able to perform virtually any manoeuvre.” In sharp contrast to this, a delivery to the Central African Republic of Chad in 1973 took a dramatic turn when rebels destroyed three lorries carrying beds. Stiegelmeyer replaced the damaged parts.

As a result of the Ostpolitik (new eastern policy) of the 1970s, relations with the socialist countries relaxed, the Iron Curtain became more permeable, and Stiegelmeyer sold beds to the GDR. The decades-old business relationship with Berlin’s famous Charité hospital was revived, for example. Back in the 1930s, Stiegelmeyer had developed a hospital bed with braked castors, especially for the Charité, thereby also making technological history. Stiegelmeyer beds were even supplied to Cuba via the GDR.

Despite these many individual successes, for almost a century hardly any effort was made to expand the company outside Germany by setting up subsidiaries. It was not until 1989 that the first step was taken, with the founding of our Stiegelmeyer BV subsidiary in the Netherlands. A short time later, all our attention turned to the domestic German market in the wake of Germany’s reunification. After the turn of the millennium, however, a whole series of new sales companies was launched: France in 2000, Poland in 2001, Finland in 2002, South Africa in 2011 and China in 2021. At the same time, the Stiegelmeyer Group also began to expand its production internationally. Today, in addition to the German sites in Herford and Nordhausen, we have state-of-the-art plants in the Polish cities of Kepno and Stolno, and in Foshan, China (not far from Hong Kong), where beds are manufactured for the Chinese market.