Schwalbe 2021 turnover and recycling efforts hit new heights

Schwalbe has revealed that 2021 was a record year for the tyre maker with revenues up around 20% to reach €273 million.

“The 2021 financial year went extremely well for us. Despite the difficult environment caused by the pandemic, we have grown very strongly which makes us proud,” says Frank Bohle, Managing Director of Ralf Bohle GmbH, the parent behind the Schwalbe brand.

Turnover has almost doubled in the past ten years; in 2011 the brand registered €140 million. One of the key factors for the significant increase in 2021 is, in addition to the generally high demand for bicycles and bicycle parts, above all for Schwalbe was the e-Bike boom. Schwalbe was able to persuade consumers in this respect with a wide product range, including the flagship Marathon E-Plus with the unplattbar seal.

“With our continuing high level of innovation and the usual Schwalbe quality, we have been setting standards in the e-bike segment for years. As a result, we have established ourselves as a benchmark for e-bike tyres among bicycle manufacturers and specialist retailers,” says Bohle.

Recycling expanded

In 2021, Schwalbe not only achieved a positive economic development, but at the same time intensively pursued the central topic of corporate responsibility.

The firm’s tube recycling programme was extended to Switzerland and is now already available in five European countries. Old tubes are collected, recycled and then used for the production of new tubes creating a functioning circular economy. The process saves 80 per cent of energy compared to the production of new butyl.

Well over six million tubes have already been collected since the project started in 2015. The successful concept is also planned to be applied to bicycle tyres in the future. The family-owned company launched a pilot project in November 2021 in cooperation with the Technical University of Cologne and Pyrum Innovations AG.

Frank Bohle concludes: “The bicycle is the means of transport of the future. Expansion of our production capacities is in full swing. In economic terms, I am therefore very optimistic that we will be able to continue our growth course in 2022. At the same time, this year, we would like to focus even more on the topic of corporate responsibility.”

Last year, the family-owned company in Reichshof in North Rhine-Westphalia completed its new headquarters, where around 70 percent of all building materials used are recyclable. 187 employees work there, and a further 61 are employed in five subsidiaries in Europe and North America.