Johs. Eckart Konservenfabrik/en

Founding of the Fruit Juice Factory in 1868

An advertisement for the fruit juice factory from 1873.

On May 2, 1868, Johannes Eckart founded the fruit juice factory "Johannes Eckart Fruchtsaftfabrik" in his apartment at Salvatorplatz 2. He sold the juices, mainly made of raspberries and blueberries, to the numerous wooden refreshment stands at the busiest squares in Munich, among others. These stands served "soda water with and without juice". Many of these refreshment stands were owned by Friedrich Seyboth, a longtime friend of Johannes’ brother Friedrich Eckart.

In 1869, the young Eckart family moved to the address Gärtnerplatz 2. The production facilities were established in the backyard and Johannes Eckart officially registered his fruit juice factory as a trade. He still mostly produced fruit juices, and he bought the raw ingredients in the countryside surrounding Munich as well as in the Bavarian Forest. His sisters Henriette and Jakobine helped him purchase wild raspberries and blueberries. Henriette, called Jette, immediately noticed when a fruit gatherer had put stones in the basket to make it heavier. Her niece Käthe remembered how Henriette "to our amusement, pulled the ears of the naughty boys and shook them hard without much ado".

According to Käthe, the fruits were processed "with little use of machines […] by members of their own family and very loyal long-term employees." Beside producing fruit juices, Johannes Eckart started to devote himself to methods for preserving fruit, vegetables and soon also meat.

The Beginnings of the Can Production

Female workers in the canning factory, undated.

The procedure for preserving food in airtight containers came from France. The Frenchman Nicolas Appert had founded the world’s first canning factory in 1804 and published his knowledge in 1810 in his book Le livre de tous les ménages, ou l’art de conserver pendant plusieurs années toutes les substances animales et végétales (The Book for All Households, or the Art of Preserving all Animal and Vegetable Products for Several Years).

In the aftermath of the war of 1870/71, Johannes Eckart started to preserve vegetables in cans. Meanwhile, his family and his production facilities had moved again, this time to their own property at Gärtnerplatz 1. In order to have enough fresh vegetables at his disposal, Johannes Eckart started to grow his own vegetables in the countryside surrounding Munich.

Shortly afterwards, he also focused on the preservation of meat. He developed various methods, for example "pickling meat under pressure", for which he submitted a patent application in 1875. His most successful product was his preserving salt, which he produced by mixing common table salt with anti-rot additives such as salicylic, boric, and benzoic acid. Johannes Eckart used it for his own food preserving business while also having sold it in small five-kilogram bags throughout Germany as well as in Scandinavia and Russia. His daughter Hedwig recalls: "Almost every day, hundreds of small five-kilogram bags, made from untreated cotton, were stitched on the sewing machine by my mother, my two elder sisters and a seamstress."

Following a business crisis in the early 1880s, Johannes Eckart also began to produce jam and sell "spice cartridges" – cartridge cases filled with spices – and the whole family helped in the production again. The business recovered and the family moved into the "Daxenberger" houses, located at Sendlinger Strasse/Dultstrasse, in 1887. These premises of "Johs. Eckart Dampf-Conserven-Fabrik" (Johannes Eckart’s Steam Canning Factory) now consisted of proper production facilities, a store and a residential house. The product range included fruit juices, canned fruit, canned vegetables, canned meat and the preserving salt.

The New Generation

As of 1900, a picture of the manufacturing plant at Jakobsplatz was shown in the letterhead.

In 1888, the next generation entered the business: Johannes’ son Friedrich (1870 to 1928). The economic situation of the company was good. For several years as of 1894, Johannes Eckart owned his own country estate in Grub, near Poing. There, the Eckart family grew peas and raspberries and established a poultry farm, managed by Johannes’ daughter Mathilde, called Tilly. However, five years later he sold the estate again and leased some crop areas from the new owner. That same year, 1899, Johannes Eckart purchased new factory buildings in Munich, at Jakobsplatz 3. Yet he did not live to see the move, as he died in November 1899 following a brief but serious illness.

At first, 29-year-old Friedrich Eckart took over the management of the canning factory, supported by his mother Susanne, who had been Johannes Eckart’s closest colleague. Friedrich already knew the company well, too; according to his siblings, he was business-minded and behaved responsibly. At that time, he had been married to Maria Korn (1876 to 1956) for two years and had a son, Hanns (1898 to 1985).

Cans for the Military

The kitchen on the factory premises at Jakobsplatz 3.

In those days, the canning factory gained a new customer base: the military. In October 1900, the Bavarian Ministry of War ordered a yearly delivery of 6,000 cans of "ox roast", "smoked pork with sauerkraut" and "field meals". From 1901, the Imperial German Navy also ordered canned meat from the company Johs. Eckart. Prior to the outbreak of World War I, these two government agencies placed large orders with the company each year.

Hence, the production increasingly focused on canned meat. The factory was soon able to proudly call itself "Purveyor to the Royal Bavarian Court". The work at Jakobsplatz 3 is described in a newspaper article dating from 1917: "Long rows of barrels filled with cranberry and raspberry juice were stored in the cellar room with plenty of space to breathe. In the huge kitchen premises, illuminated as bright as day thanks to the high-lying windows, enormous oxen’s legs and juicy pork are processed into canned meat with spicy ingredients. […] According to a new method, the filled cans are closed by a machine with double lock seams and then placed into an autoclave, where they are sterilized with hot steam. The machine room also contains machines that process the huge amounts of fruit and vegetables for preservation. The airy and dry storerooms for the supplies are located on the factory’s upper floors. The floors are linked by an elevator." By around 1900, approximately 20 to 25 people worked in the canning factory, producing, on average, 4,500 kilograms of cans per day. The working hours were stated in the work regulations: from 7 am to 12 am (with a half-hour break at 9.30 am) and from 1 pm to 6 pm (break from 3.30 pm to 4 pm). On Saturdays, the female staff finished work at 5.30 pm.

The Subsidiary in Zamdorf

Product presentation by the canning factory Johs. Eckart in Zamdorf, 1915, colorized afterwards.

It was in 1906 that Friedrich’s younger brother Otto (1877 to 1942) joined the company. In 1907, the brothers’ uncle, Friedrich Eckart, died and bequeathed to them his asphalt factory in Zamdorf, a district of Munich. This is where, from 1910, Friedrich and Otto established a subsidiary of the canning factory at Jakobsplatz 3. Over time, more and more new machines were added, so that the facility was state-of-the-art in no time. The steadily growing production of canned meat was also transferred to Zamdorf. With land purchases, the fields in Zamdorf were extended to eleven hectares. Otto and Fritz concentrated on growing peas, beans, and various fruit trees.

It had become necessary to extend the factory, particularly as the Bavarian army were placing ever larger orders. The quality of the canned food was considered to be good. The Military Medical Academy’s hygienic department assessed them as follows: "Beef and pork goulash Eckart: both meats soft and tasty, broth of very pleasant taste, good canned food. … Field meal Eckart: piquant, but not overly spicy, very copious and filling. Good canned food."

A series of photographs which documented the production in Zamdorf was taken in 1915. In July 1916, Ludwig III, the last Bavarian King, who had already visited the facilities at Jakobsplatz 3 as a Prince in 1901, came to see the factory in Zamdorf.

World War I

Delivery from Jakobsplatz to the navy, 1915.

The beginning of the war in 1914 led to a hectic and exhausting time for the company Johs. Eckart. In their contracts with the military buyers, the Eckarts had committed themselves to quickly increasing the number of cans in the event of war. This meant they had to withdraw from all contracts with private customers. Furthermore, production was switched to "raw canning", i. e. the meat was only cut and seasoned. However, since the army had switched to meat that keeps well (ham, bacon, and sausages) as of 1915, meat producers such as the Eckarts were sometimes even left with surplus cans.

From 1915, Friedrich Eckart managed the company on his own again, because Otto, as reservist captain, moved to the navy in Kiel. During the course of the war, there were shortages of raw materials and tinplate. Friedrich Eckart experimented with drying methods and produced dried potatoes, amongst others.

Inflation, War and Closedown

After the end of the war, the Eckarts lost their main customer: the army. The bad state of the economy and inflation resulted in significant losses for the company. Currency depreciation reached its peak in 1923. All invested savings and all the working capital of companies lost their value, so that numerous small businesses had to close down. Many of the main companies responded to this crisis by founding new companies with the aid of banks; these new companies were supposed to restart the businesses that had gone bankrupt or closed. Fritz and Otto Eckart also participated in founding a few of such new companies, for example in Plattling, Schwandorf, Amberg and Furth im Wald. These investments did not prove successful, and the activities nearly led to the company’s ruin.

Friedrich’s son Hanns had entered the company in 1922. A deli department was opened, where truffles, sauces, anchovies, capers, olives, and other delicatessen were on sale. Efforts were made to find new business partners abroad, for example in Switzerland, Hungary, Romania, Russia, and Turkey. However, they failed to put the company back on a successful track. The company was unable to support two families. The brothers Friedrich and Otto separated their businesses; in 1926, Otto left the company in return for a compensation payment. Friedrich, who had had to sell the house at Jakobsplatz, died one year later.

In the years that followed, Hanns Eckart managed to stabilize the canning factory in Zamdorf by specializing in the preservation of mushrooms and wild berries in addition to vegetables and meat. When World War II broke out, the demand for canned food increased. The company then also produced frozen "homogenized whole egg" for bulk customers such as hospitals and pastry chefs. In 1944, the house at Jakobsplatz, including the business premises still leased there, burned down following an air raid, and Zamdorf was also hit by bombs. The destroyed buildings in Zamdorf were rebuilt, but the company did not recover in the post-war period.

In 1968, Hanns Eckart, Otto’s son Werner Eckart and Hermann Meuser founded the successor company "Joh's Eckart GmbH" (limited company); the company’s purpose is "to take over the company operated by Dr. Hanns Eckart under the company name Joh's Eckart, continuing the hitherto existing company". The company no longer produced any cans at that time; the buildings were used for other purposes. The limited company still exists to this day, but without business operations.