Sometimes you only realize in retrospect how much courage you had at the beginning.
When the management of HE Wägetechnik Horst Eßmann GmbH passed from the 5th generation of the Eßmann family to Dr.-Ing. Fabian Ehmke and Dr.-Ing. Gregor Graßl in April 2021 and René Teichmann joined shortly afterwards, ESSMANN was a traditional family business with an impressive history – but now also with a fairly small team. 15 people plus management. 15 people whose roots go back to 1860. And three new managing directors who had stepped up to lead this history into a new era.
I also became part of this team in 2021. At the time, I thought it was brave of three young fathers to take over such an old company. I admit: I feared a lot of “We’ve always done it this way” and a culture shock between the old-established Waagenbau cracks and the new colleagues who wanted to bring in new ideas with a bang. It turned out differently.
Respect and eye level in the team
Respect was a top priority from the very beginning. Both the experience of the team members, some of whom had been working for ESSMANN for decades, and the expertise and energy of the newcomers were valued – and everyone was open and curious about each other.
It is remarkable that several colleagues who had gone other ways in the meantime were won back by the new management. They not only brought back experience, but also trust, solidarity and a piece of ESSMANN history.
Today, in May 2026, we are 49 people. 15 have become 49. A traditional scale manufacturer has become a group of companies that combines old strengths with new opportunities: Weighing technology, automation, software, store, service, calibration, yard management and a steadily growing presence in Germany. This is a real team effort. And sometimes our time-honored company feels like a dynamic start-up.
Five years towards the future
So much has happened since 2021 that we sometimes forget to pause and celebrate what we have already achieved. Sometimes awards from the Proven Expert customer review portal or the Employee evaluation portal kununu in the mailbox. Or the information from the Süddeutsche Zeitung and Creditreform that, according to their analysis, we are one of the 100 fastest-growing medium-sized companies are among them. As a Rhinelander, I sometimes have to smile at the fact that such success stories are usually acknowledged briefly with a very North German “Oh, cool!”. And then they carry on – with the usual understatement, the right balance between risk-taking and a sense of proportion and an unshakeable optimism, even if times are not the easiest for the industry at the moment.
And sometimes you only realize in retrospect how many individual steps have resulted in a new direction.
This timeline is therefore more than just a list. It is proof of how consistently ESSMANN has grown since 2021 – not only in terms of minds, but also in terms of expertise, reach, structure and self-image. And it shows that behind every stage there are people who have pulled, learned, supported and shaped the company.
ESSMANN 2021 until today
Das neue Führungsteam
Die Geschäftsführung wird von der Familie Eßmann an Dr.-Ing. Fabian Ehmke und Dr.-Ing. Gregor Graßl übergeben. Kurz darauf stößt René Teichmann zur Geschäftsführung. Zu diesem Zeitpunkt besteht das Team deutschlandweit aus 15 Mitarbeitenden plus Geschäftsführung, mit einer Niederlassung in Baden-Württemberg.
Der Waagen-Discounter kommt mit der WHI
WHI Wägetechnik wird Teil der ESSMANN Gruppe. Mit WHI kommt der damalige Online-Shop Waagen-Discounter zum Kerngeschäft hinzu. ESSMANN erweitert damit sein Spektrum deutlich in Richtung Präzisionswaagen, Shopgeschäft und direkt verfügbare Wägetechnik.
Das neue Logo
ESSMANN verabschiedet sich vom alten Logo. Das neue Erscheinungsbild mit dem markanten roten Dot, der fortan als Qualitätssiegel steht, und neuen Farben macht sichtbar, was intern längst begonnen hatte: ESSMANN bleibt ESSMANN, aber ESSMANN tritt klarer, moderner und zukunftsorientierter auf.
Der neue Waagen-Shop
Der Waagen-Discounter wird abgelöst vom neuen essmann-shop.com. Neues Design, neue Software-Version, neue Produkte – und vor allem ein anderes Selbstverständnis: Der Shop wird nicht als losgelöster Versandkanal gedacht, sondern als Teil eines Fachbetriebs, der deutschlandweit Service, Wartung, Kalibrierung und Beratung bietet.
Die neue ESSMANN-Homepage
Der Relaunch von essmann.com bringt das neue Selbstverständnis auch auf die Hauptseite. Die Homepage wird frisch, klar, modern und fachlich stärker ausgerichtet. ESSMANN | Waagen & Automation wird zur Dachmarke der HE Wägetechnik Horst Eßmann GmbH, der WHI Wägetechnik und des früheren Waagen-Discounters.
Die neue Niederlassung West
ESSMANN eröffnet mit Dominik Vollbrecht und Markus Wehebrink eine weitere Niederlassung in Niedersachsen. Der Standort West in Wallenhorst stärkt die regionale Nähe, insbesondere im westniedersächsischen und ostwestfälischen Raum. Für Kunden bedeutet das kürzere Wege, mehr Präsenz und greifbaren Service vor Ort.
Die neue Niederlassung Rhein-Ruhr
Die Wägetechnik Heinz VISSER GmbH in Duisburg wird Teil der ESSMANN Unternehmensgruppe. VISSER wurde 1962 gegründet und bringt ein erfahrenes Team, viel regionale Verankerung und starke Kompetenz in mobiler Wägetechnik, Industriewaagen, Laborwaagen und Kalibrierung ein. Damit wird die Metropolregion Rhein-Ruhr deutlich besser versorgt.
Wachstumsstärkste Mittelständler
Laut Analyse von SZ Institut und Creditreform zählt ESSMANN zu den wachstumsstärksten Mittelständlern Deutschlands. In der Veröffentlichung bei der Süddeutschen Zeitung wird Platz 50 im Ranking der dynamischsten Mittelständler genannt – noch ohne Berücksichtigung der im Frühjahr 2025 erfolgten Eingliederung von VISSER.
165 Jahre ESSMANN – und 30 Jahre Klaus Hüber im Süden
2025 ist für ESSMANN ein besonderes Jubiläumsjahr: Das Unternehmen feiert seinen 165. Geburtstag. Gleichzeitig begeht auch unsere Niederlassung in Baden-Württemberg ihr 30-jähriges Bestehen – gemeinsam mit ihrem Leiter Klaus Hüber, der seit drei Jahrzehnten zum Unternehmen gehört. Als unser erfahrenster Vertriebsmitarbeiter kennt er den Süden Deutschlands wie kaum ein anderer und findet für unsere Kunden immer die passenden Lösungen.
Top Company & Gehaltszufriedenheit
kununu vergibt ESSMANN das Top Company-Siegel 2025 sowie das Top Rated-Siegel Gehaltszufriedenheit 2025. Für uns ist das mehr als ein Label. Es zeigt, dass Wachstum nicht nur nach außen stattfinden darf, sondern auch nach innen spürbar werden muss.
Von Kunden empfohlen
Das Bewertungsportal Proven Expert hat unsere Kundenrezensionen ausgewertet. Mit einem Wert von 4,74 von 5 Sternen gehören wir zu den von Kunden am häufigsten empfohlenen Betrieben in Deutschland.
Gehaltszufriedenheit & Familienfreundlichkeit
kununu vergibt erneut das Top Company-Siegel, das Top Rated-Siegel Gehaltszufriedenheit sowie das neue Top Rated-Siegel Familienfreundlichkeit an ESSMANN. Gleichzeitig wird ESSMANN nach Unternehmensangaben erneut bei den 100 wachstumsstärksten Mittelständlern Deutschlands aufgeführt – diesmal auf Platz 49.
49
49 ist die Zahl, die uns auch intern besonders freut: Wir sind 49 Teammitglieder. Seit 2021 haben wir uns damit mehr als verdreifacht. Und hinter dieser Zahl stehen nicht Stellen, sondern Menschen. Bemerkenswert: Fast 25 Prozent davon sind Frauen. Im April 2021 arbeitete nur eine einzige Frau im Team.
Die neue ESSMANN Software-Plattform
Der nächste Entwicklungsschritt ist bereits vorbereitet: In den kommenden Wochen stellen wir die neue ESSMANN Softwareplattform für die Prozesse rund um Waage und Hoflogistik vor. Von Grund auf neu entwickelt, verbindet sie fast drei Jahrzehnte EWP-Wägesoftware-Erfahrung mit moderner, sicherer und besser wartbarer Technologie. Damit beginnt die nächste Generation digitaler Wäge- und Yard-Prozesse bei ESSMANN.
Growth is great. Cohesion is better.
It’s easy to talk about growth in light of these milestones if you only look at turnover, locations or rankings. However, I am particularly impressed by this team, which has brought old and new worlds together – without mistrust, without a clash of skills, without jealousy. Instead, with openness, respect and a shared understanding that ESSMANN will only have a successful future if we shape it together.
On a day-to-day basis, this means training new colleagues, sharing knowledge, clarifying responsibilities, writing down processes that were perhaps previously taken for granted, developing new processes, making decisions more quickly, tolerating mistakes, handing over and taking on responsibility. Of course, there are sometimes crunches.
But overcoming this is the real achievement of this team. ESSMANN didn’t grow because there were suddenly new bosses and – bang – everything was great. ESSMANN grew because people were prepared to embrace change. Because old experience and new ideas were not played off against each other. Because technology, sales, IT, store, service, back office, management and communication took the same sentence seriously in many areas: We are building something together here. And because we are very united and consistent in our self-image as a scale manufacturer – trust in weighing precision for the global flow of goods.
The great trust that René Teichmann, Fabian Ehmke and Gregor Graßl place in each and every member of the team has long since paid off. The result is a team in which everyone thinks along, everyone sees the big picture, everyone feels responsible for satisfied customers and cohesion within the company. Where nobody has to be afraid of making a mistake because colleagues are always ready to support. That is one of our great strengths: We make time for each other when it’s needed.
What has changed – and what hasn’t
Many things look different today than in 2021. The logo. The website. The store. The locations. The company structure. The topics we work on. The speed with which we tackle things. The breadth of our range: from the Ultra-microbalance up to Rail scalesfrom which the Calibration of the Industrial scales from the store up to Truck scales with License plate recognition, from the classic Scale maintenance up to digital yard control.
The requirement that weighing technology must function reliably has remained the same. A scale determines the value of goods, recipes, invoicing, verification, process reliability, auditability – and sometimes simply whether a truck can continue its journey or not. Anyone who builds, maintains, calibrates and digitally integrates scales is always working at a critical point in the process.
That’s why the combination of tradition and future suits ESSMANN so well. We deliver modern solutions that work in everyday life. And at the same time, we maintain the calm and patience that you need when it comes to reliable measured values, heavy systems and evolved customer processes.
From the customer’s point of view, ESSMANN offers an advantage that is worth a lot in business: you can quickly find the right contact person and get not only a product, but also service. You can start small – with a store scale, for example – and still have access to a company that can provide maintenance, calibration, repair and technical advice throughout Germany. And if an individual scale later becomes an integrated process, we have the expertise for this in-house.
And what comes next?
Our next major milestone will be released in just a few weeks: a new, future-proof ESSMANN software platform for processes relating to scales and yard logistics.flogistik.
After almost three decades of in-house expertise in the development of weighing software and digital process integration, ESSMANN is now entering a new software era. With EWP and EWPsmart we have created solutions over many years that reliably map our customers’ weighing processes, record data, simplify workflows and enable interfaces to existing systems. We are now transferring this experience into a modern, secure and future-proof architecture – more modular, clearer, easier to expand and consistently geared towards connecting weighing processes, data flows, automation and operational processes in a stable and secure manner.
The important thing is that EWP will not disappear. The existing EWP software generation is still working reliably for our customers today – and will continue to do so. The new platform is not a cut, but a further development: 30 years of software experience, translated into an architecture that will meet the requirements of the coming years.
A team that has achieved more than numbers can say
When I look at the time since 2021, I don’t see a perfect straight line upwards. I see many people who have made things possible. People who stayed when many things were new. People who joined and immediately took on responsibility. People who brought in old experience and opened up new paths. People who took care of things in the background without anyone really noticing. People who were out and about when others were off work. People who asked questions, looked for solutions, reassured customers, got systems up and running again and supported colleagues.
That’s why this article is one thing above all: a thank you to the whole team.
Thank you to everyone who has supported ESSMANN since 2021. Thank you to those who have been with us for a long time and are not holding on to their knowledge, but passing it on. Thank you to those who have joined us recently and bring a fresh perspective, speed and energy. Thank you to our management, who had the courage not to manage a 160-year-old company, but to think ahead. And thanks to a team that shows that transformation doesn’t have to be cold and loud. It can also be North German, clear, hard-working, sometimes exhausting and pretty great.
And what do colleagues say?
I also asked colleagues: What has particularly impressed you at ESSMANN over the last five years? And I found these voices in our mailbox:
Want to find out more? Or join the team right away?
Have I aroused your curiosity with this article? Good. That was exactly my intention.
Whether you are looking for a large, industrial or small scale, want to optimize your weighing process, or want to be one of the first to make an appointment for a software demo, or simply want to know who is behind ESSMANN – here are your entry points for contacting us:
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