BIRKENSTOCK People | Torsten Mueller - Production Manager of The Buckle at #BIRKENSTOCK

Production manager Torsten Müller clearly enjoys being at the factory in Markersdorf. As a highly trained technician, he embodies Karl Birkenstock’s legacy, which is expressed here in numerous practical inventions and rigorous processes. The entire facility, completed in 2007, was designed under Karl Birkenstock’s supervision. It is a unique place, created solely to develop and produce at scale the perfect buckle. The Base material of the buckle starts life as a huge roll of steel, which weighs more than most family cars. The enormous cylinder of metal is split into a series of narrow bands. Imagine a cucumber being cut into slices. Each slice of the steel cucumber is delivered to the production line and fed into one of three presses in the Markersdorf plant. Tens of thousands of distinctive metal buckles are cut, punched, pressed, and bent from these sections of steel, as the low bass note of incessant machinery forms the soundtrack of the working day. #BIRKENSTOCKPeople #TorstenMueller #TheBuckle