A company with a history
      not just pies in the sky

The history of Extrawurst has an exquisite beginning – in the true sense of the word. Because before founder Lothar Hagebaum turned towards the grill, he worked as a confectioner, baking all sorts of delicious cakes and tortes. Back then in the 1970s. Fries and sausages are still in the distant future – but the young father tirelessly works towards starting a business of his own.

“I was full of thirst for action, and I had to find a way to provide for my family”, Lothar Hagebaum remembers. “It had to be something different. In a pastry shop, you prepare the sweets with a lot of passion in the back room – and then at the counter somebody else sells them. The customers get only a glimpse of the confectioner’s enthusiasm. That is why I wanted to do something different, where I could produce and sell at the same time.”

Lothar Hagebaum wants to be his own boss – and a ground-breaking pioneering idea comes at a Christmas fare. There the young German father notes an American stand with hamburgers and hot dogs, which he could not stop thinking about. Without further ado, he draws a sketch of his own stand and contracts a coach builder to make it. In 1981, the time has arrived: in the German city of Plettenberg, Lothar Hagebaum opens his first snack stand.

From the outset on, the entrepreneur puts his focus on the highest quality and customer satisfaction. But above all, his snacks are meant to be: honest(ly). tasty. And from the first day on, the customers embrace this. Hagebaum’s burgers, hot dogs and grilled sausages sell like hot cakes. In Easter week he even sells around 12,000 sausages. It comes as no surprise that in 1982 he opens his second stand – and in 1983, the third one. And because sausages are what lies at the heart of his business, the artisan spontaneously invents his own one: the Lüdenscheid sausage. A sausage that has become Lothar Hagebaums’s hallmark.

Ceaselessly, the sausage specialist experiments. He tries new flavors and tests various sauces, which he cooks at home. And his family lends him a hand. His wife keeps the founder from being distracted and helps in the office. As for his son Kim, they do not raise him by the ketchup bottle, but at the weekends he does occasionally accompany his father to the delivery of goods, to be later rewarded with a tasty Lüdenscheid sausage. And Kim literally acquires a taste: as a child his favorite plaything are toy pots – and as a teenager he graduates to the real pans.

To laze around? That is not an option for Kim Hagebaum. Instead of twiddling his thumbs during school vacations, the then sixteen years old boy turns sausages. Meanwhile his father’s company has grown. He now puts up his stands predominantly at building supply stores, and on the menu there are no more hamburgers and hot dogs, but exclusively grilled sausages and fries. Kim helps from morning to evening. He grills and he fries, and often he peels up to 70 pounds of onions per day. Still he cannot imagine a career at this father’s company – but this will change soon.

“I completed an apprenticeship as an assistant tax consultant”, explains Kim Hagebaum, today’s Extrawurst CEO. “But looking out of the window of my office job back then, I only thought: I have to get out of here”. No sooner said than done. Kim Hagebaum quits and in 2004 he re-enters the sausage business. But does he get extra treatment being the founder’s son? Not a sausage! Before taking over the executive post, he must put on an apron, take the barbecue fork in hand and work behind the counter. In the evenings and at the weekends he goes to school again, studying business studies.

His studies give him new impetus, and Kim eagerly puts his new ideas into practice. The ordinary sausage posts turn into a brand. “One evening we met as a family to find a new name”, Kim Hagebaum remembers. “ʻExtrawurstʼ made us all grin.” (In German, Extrawurst has a double meaning: extra sausage, but also special treatment). Nowadays the name adorns all stands of the sausage specialist from Lüdenscheid. But much more is happening: the overall image becomes standardized, the marketing becomes more professional, and new ideas are put to the test. They launch campaigns with Italian sausages and curry-arrabiata or Christmas sausages with cinnamon. One day Kim Hagebaum even puts on a giant piglet custom to call clientr’s attention to discounts. But in 2006 he comes up with the truly pioneering idea.

Again and again, employees approach the Hagebaums, asking for advice to found their own snack stands. Kim Hagebaum does not hesitate too long and develops the Extrawurst franchise system. From this point on there is no holding back. New stands open. Nevertheless, the focus is still on quality over quantity. Extrawurst deliberately decides to not inaugurate more than five new stands per year. “Of course we could tackle 20 outlets per year. And with the right partners, we are disposed to do so”, the CEO explains. “But we do not rush things. Honest quality and sustainability are more important to us than fast growth.”

Today Extrawurst encompasses 22 outlets in the German federal states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Hesse,takes pride in its 65 energetic employees and year by year gains new franchise partners. Each year around 1,000,000 sausages and around 200,000 lbs of fries are sold. And even an Extrawurst app is being launched. Meanwhile Lothar Hagebaum has withdrawn from day-to-day business and has handed over the operational scepter to his son Kim. In close cooperation with his employees, Kim Hagebaum drives the company ahead and makes sure that Extrawurst will continue to stand for something very concrete: honest(ly). tasty