Updated: 2026-07-19

Steiff — the world's oldest plush maker, founded by a woman in a wheelchair

Steiff was founded in 1880 in Giengen, southern Germany, by Margarete Steiff. Having used a wheelchair since childhood polio, she built a livelihood on her sewing skills — and a felt elephant pincushion she made is considered the starting point of the world's oldest plush manufacturer.

In 1902 her nephew Richard Steiff developed “55PB,” a bear with jointed, movable limbs. A 3,000-piece American order at the 1903 Leipzig fair made Steiff the supplier of the teddy bear boom. The Button in Ear (Knopf im Ohr), introduced in 1904, is known as one of the earliest trademark-protection devices.

Steiff still accepts repairs of its own products at its German headquarters (listed in our English comparison table). A hundred-year-old bear, repaired and passed to the next generation — the original model of the plush repair trade.

Sources

• プティルウ — テディベアの歴史
• Steiff — FAQ (repairs)

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