One of Rheinstetten’s largest employers is celebrating an anniversary: 15 years ago, EDEKA Südwest Fleisch opened its Rheinstetten plant for the production and processing of meat and sausage products. The company marked the anniversary with a small ceremony on September 5, 2026, to which employees who have been working at the site since its opening in 2011 were invited.
EDEKA Südwest, the wholesale arm of the EDEKA Group in southwest Germany, invested around €85 million in the construction of a new production facility near the A5 motorway. After just 18 months of construction, the plant officially opened on July 2, 2011, with an open house attended by approximately 20,000 people. “Even at the opening, it was clear: Rheinstetten is an investment in the future – for our company, the EDEKA stores in southwest Germany, and for the entire region,” recalls Jürgen Mäder, who, as Managing Director of EDEKA Südwest Fleisch in 2011, played a key role in the project’s implementation and is now a member of the EDEKA Südwest board. “The fact that the production facility has developed so dynamically over the past 15 years since relocating from the two sites in Offenburg and Heddesheim to Rheinstetten demonstrates how correct this decision was,” Mäder continues. At its launch, the Rheinstetten site employed around 950 people; today, that number has grown to approximately 1,400. In 2011, up to 3,000 different products were shipped from Rheinstetten to EDEKA supermarkets in southwest Germany; currently, that number has reached around 6,400. The focus of the anniversary celebration on September 5th was primarily on the people behind this success. “Many colleagues have been with us since day one. Their experience, dedication, and identification with the site have shaped Rheinstetten,” stated Edwin Mantel, Managing Director of EDEKA Südwest Fleisch, adding: “This anniversary is above all a thank you to our employees.”
Modern production facilities meet traditional craftsmanship
From the outset, the facility was designed as a service center for the independent retailers of the EDEKA Group in southwest Germany. From Rheinstetten, more than 1,000 stores are supplied with fresh meat, sausages, self-service and convenience foods, as well as cheese and fish. Modern facilities for butchering, production, and packaging combine with a high level of traditional craftsmanship. The EDEKA Südwest Fleisch team comprises more than 80 master butchers. The various products are manufactured or traded on approximately 40,000 square meters of production space – complemented by an in-house specialty manufacturing facility, a training workshop for apprentices, and test kitchens for developing new product ideas. One of the key focuses of EDEKA Südwest Fleisch’s product range is on regionally produced goods. The company maintains partnerships with more than 400 farms in the region. Some of these farms supply the regional brand Hofglück for pork, where all five stages of the value chain (birth, rearing, fattening, slaughter, processing) take place in the German states within the EDEKA Südwest sales region. The products are labeled with two stars of the German Animal Welfare Federation’s “For More Animal Welfare” label and are advertised as conforming to the highest conventional husbandry standard, level 4. Another example is Schwarzwald organic pasture-raised beef: Behind this brand is a producers’ association with around 160 farms from the Black Forest. They have been supplying EDEKA Südwest Fleisch since 1998. Furthermore, EDEKA Südwest Fleisch collaborates with approximately 550 Bioland-certified organic farms in Germany for beef and pork.
