Schimmel built a second line in Poland and named it twice.

Schimmel of Braunschweig, founded by Wilhelm Schimmel in 1885, went east for its cheaper pianos in the early years of the 2000s. Its own history, under the heading “2003 – Kalisz | Poland,” says: “a separate manufacturing plant was established in the piano capital Kalisz in Poland… Schimmel Pianos takes over a small restoration business, from which a respectable piano factory is being developed over a period of nine years.” Piano Buyer dates the purchase to 2002 and names the business as the PianoEurope factory; we give 2002–03. Kalisz has a long piano-making tradition in Poland, older than Schimmel’s arrival, which Schimmel’s phrase “the piano capital” invokes.

The line had two names. Piano Buyer says Schimmel “at first used the Kalisz factory to manufacture its Vogel brand, a moderately priced line named for the company’s president. This line has now been replaced by the Wilhelm Schimmel brand, named for the company’s founder.” Schimmel’s own history does not mention Vogel; it says grand and upright pianos were made at Kalisz “under the instrument series ‘Wilhelm Schimmel’… based on older Schimmel designs… A real alternative to many cheap Asian products. Quality from the beginning | Made in Europe | by Schimmel.” A French magazine review quoted on Schimmel’s site shows the Wilhelm Schimmel name in use by 2017.

Using the founder’s first name for the cheaper line is a deliberate piece of branding. Schimmel says the brand “Wilhelm” was created “as a reminiscence of the company founder Wilhelm Schimmel”; the company itself is legally Wilhelm Schimmel Pianofortefabrik GmbH. The second line thus borrows the full name of the firm.

Made in Europe — with parts from three places.

Piano Buyer describes how the Polish line was put together: “Wilhelm Schimmel models use rims, soundboards, and strings from Germany; actions sourced in Asia; and cabinet parts from Poland. Final regulation and preparation are done in Schimmel’s facility in Braunschweig.” Schimmel told the guide that lower Polish costs gave a piano “approximately 30% less costly than comparable Schimmel models.” “Made in Europe” was the honest summary: German structural parts, Asian actions, Polish cabinets and assembly, German finishing. The label describes where most of the work was done, which is exactly the question the origin rules discussed elsewhere in this series ask.

That places Wilhelm Schimmel in a European pattern. Piano Buyer’s 2022 survey of the American market noted that “Several German companies have started or acquired second-tier lines,” naming W. Hoffmann from Bechstein in the Czech Republic — sold, in Bechstein’s words, as “Made in Europe by C. Bechstein” — and “Wilhelm Schimmel, formerly Vogel (by Schimmel), in Poland.” Schimmel added a third tier later: Fridolin Schimmel, made by Pearl River in China and named, Piano Buyer says, for the founder’s younger brother, who emigrated to America in 1890 and founded a piano firm in Faribault, Minnesota, in 1893 — so even the China-made tier carries a piece of genuine family history.

Ownership changed above all of this. In 2016, Piano Buyer says, “the Chinese piano maker Pearl River purchased a majority interest in Schimmel, in which the Schimmel family remains shareholders.” Schimmel’s own timeline calls it a “Financial strategic alliance with the world’s largest piano manufacturer”; Pearl River’s 2016 annual report put its stake at 90 per cent, completed that May. Schimmel’s timeline places Fridolin Schimmel in 2018, two years after the deal.

Three tiers, three tariff lines.

Wilhelm Schimmel’s place of manufacture also put it on the right side of a tariff line. The US tariff schedule charges a general duty of 4.7 per cent on upright and grand pianos (headings 9201.10 and 9201.20); pianos from China carry an extra 7.5 per cent under the “List 4A” duties the US Trade Representative imposed in 2019, which remain in the 2026 schedule. A Polish-assembled piano was outside that list; a Chinese-made Fridolin Schimmel was not. A brand’s three tiers can therefore face three different import costs.

The American market itself is supplied mainly from Asia. UN Comtrade data show that in 2023 Japan supplied 58.4 per cent of the value of upright pianos imported into the United States, Indonesia 25.7 per cent, Germany 5.5 per cent and China 5.9 per cent. A 1999 US International Trade Commission study had observed that “U.S. producers are major importers, buying foreign-produced pianos to complement their product lines” — and European makers, as Schimmel’s tiers show, do the same in their own way.

The Wilhelm Schimmel story now has an ending. Schimmel’s page for the series reads: “Model Series discontinued. Limited Availablity. Please ask for availability your Schimmel Dealer!” — the misspelling is the page’s. Archived copies show that the notice was not there in November 2025 and was there by March 2026.

A founder’s motto, and a successor series.

Its successor keeps the founder in view. A new “Schimmel Europe” series, whose page first appeared in August 2025, was named, Schimmel says, “As a reminiscence to the motto of the company founder Wilhelm Schimmel ‘affordable quality’,” and Schimmel describes a different division of labour: “the entire strungback including the soundboard of the Europe instruments are entirely manufactured in our Braunschweig factory. At our production facility in Kalisz, Poland… complete a genuine European instrument from these strungbacks at a lower cost.” We report the Kalisz plant’s continued operation as Schimmel’s statement. The new series runs from the E 116 and E 121 uprights to the E 208 grand. Piano Buyer’s brand profile, at the time of writing, still presented the Wilhelm Schimmel line as current; brand guides and buyers’ guides often lag the makers’ own pages.

The founder’s motto still heads the company’s homepage: “QUALITY WILL PREVAIL,” which it calls “the philosophy of Wilhelm Schimmel when he founded the company in 1885.” For a design guide, the lesson is that a founder’s name is a powerful but finite resource: Schimmel spent it on a second line, then moved the founder’s memory to a motto and a new series name.

For this guide we use a plum and a pale lilac with a founder serif. These are an unofficial interpretation, not Schimmel’s colour values, and nothing of its logo is reproduced.

Keep Wilhelm Schimmel’s identity on hand — save it to a board in the Made Good inspiration library.