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The Spinning Wheel, the Uckermark and the Internet
A fairytale from the 21st century
image author: Fam. Henkys There were once a woman and her husband, both turners. They moved from Berlin's outskirts to the charming hills of the Uckermark.
They found a quiet domicile in Wallmow, north-east of Prenzlau.
There thy settled to pursue their craft, the producing of spinning wheels.
In regulated DDR-times it came about, that wood for spinning wheel building became scares.
Only Robinia, categorised as miscellaneous mixed hardwood, was still available but avoided by carpenters and joiners because of its hardness.
image author: Fam .Henkys Herr and Frau Henkys made a virtue of necessity and used this wood for building spinning wheels.
As it turned out the Robinia is because of its hardness especially suited for spinning wheels.
Through usage of Robinia and due to the high quality processing were the Henkys able to give their customers the long guarantee time of 10 years.
Robinia has also the great characteristic that woodworms don't like the wood at all, which is beneficial for long storage before the handling of the wood.
Robinia is weatherproof and always looks good.
image author: Fam .Henkys But the DDR was ending and with it the assured demand for spinning wheels.
As many other DDR craftsmen and artists, the Henkys had to wrestle with uncertainness and the change in all areas of living.
For two, three years no spinning wheels were sold.
They wanted to give up the building of spinning wheels and produce other things when bit by bit request were asked for again. People remembered again the solid spinning wheels from the Uckermark.
The new time brought contemporary work methods with it. Herr and Frau Henkys were now able to produce a spinning wheel in much shorter time.
The sale tripled.
But suddenly the competition grew.
People from Germany's east were now able to buy spinning wheels kits from New Zealand. Or from Holland where they were produced industrial with plastic parts. In America, people knew how market themselves and how to develop a better wheel. America produced faster spinning wheels.
image author: Fam .Henkys Spinners can demonstrate their speediness at competitions. Herr and Frau Henkys took also part at one of those competitions. Of course they wanted to win. They had the deciding advantage, to have produced their own piece of sport equipment. That is why they developed the fast spinning wheel. They have won several competitions even though they didn't have the routine or training as other constantly spinning spinner. They were turners after all and not spinner.
image author: Fam .Henkys But Frau Henkys is not only a turner she is also a smart woman. She was always looking for possibilities to safeguard their livelihood.
The 21st century dawned and with it the constantly growing usage and spreading of the Internet. The technical preconditions improved also in little Wallmow and with it the option to advertise their good spinning wheel in the whole of Germany.
Herr Henkys was sceptical whether the Internet would be beneficial to him as craftsman.
image author: Fam .Henkys Still his wife designed an Internet page that shows and describes the spinning wheel in detail.
She had done it so well that this page landed at front at the search engine Google at the one word search and consequently attracted many visitors and buyers. She learned a lot about the Internet and knows now that there is no business to be made without the Internet.
Herr Henkys has now recognised the advantage of the Internet. Today they are selling spinning wheels also in Switzerland and Norway. And when they were able to produce large quantities they would put pages in English and Swedish in the Internet to conquer these markets.
And so Herr and Frau Henkys live happily in the lovely Wallmow in the Uckermark and when they are not turning they surf the Internet.
image author: Fam .Henkys
Copyright city-map Uckermark 2005
The pictures were kindly made available by Herr and Frau Henkys. Their Homepage offers lots of information about their Spinning Wheels.
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