We look back: In the first half of the 19th century, a small city in Saxony developed to a centre for making musical instruments. In Markneukirchen, in the "year of revolution" 1848 the woodwind instrument maker Johann Friedrich Dick founded a company for the manufacture and trade of music supplies, accessories and special tools. The enormous demand for orchestral instruments, above all from the "new world", enabled his son Heinrich Adolph to quickly build up export business. When he turned the business over to his son Heinrich Hermann at the beginning of the 20th century, thanks to worldwide commerce, Markneukirchen had become one of the most prosperous cities in Germany. Under the brand name HERDIM (Hermann Dick Markneukirchen), the globally thinking company published multilingual catalogs, exporting to all continents.
With the onset of the Second World War and the communist occupation which followed, forbidding free trade, the company was unable to continue as before. As a result, in 1948 his son Günther Dick settled in the lower Bavarian town of Metten, the home of his wife, where he started again "from the beginning" with a small production and trade of musical accessories and special tools.
Once again, it was good international contacts which led his son Heinrich to a revolutionary business idea at the beginning of the 1980s: while travelling in Japan, his attention was drawn to the excellent wood-working
tools, especially saws and sharpening stones: a quality appreciated in the regal discipline of wood-working, must be valued by all other wood-workers, whether professional or amateur, as well. And in this way the news of the fine Japanese tools spread like wild fire from carpenter to piano maker. Heinrich Dick engaged his brother, the engineer Dr. Rudolf Dick, and together they developed the name DICK over the last 20 years to the very name for outstanding tools.
It was quickly recognised that Japanese blacksmithing art gives superb products, not only for chisels but also for cutting tools in the kitchen. Thus, DICK was the first company, that imported high-quality tools and kitchen knives from Japan.
Since 2005, Petra Steinberger, now managing partner, has been leading the company as part of the subsequent regulation with a highly committed team. In Mai 2011 the company name was chanched to DICTUM.
DICTUM unites the two brands DICK and HERDIM. DICK as brand further on represents the tool devision, HERDIM for products of the instrument making line.
