[ Cover Story ]
[ Cover Story ]
Hanne and President Hermann Butting in front of a new pipe mill for special pipes from coils.
“ At it’ s heart, the company’ s core focus on manufacturing longitudinally welded stainless steel pipes remains unchanged,” stresses Mr Heinzle.“ Stainless steel pipes are the backbone of our corporate strategy. BUTTING’ s numerous locations are divided into two business areas. The Plant Construction Division focuses entirely on the BUTTING Group’ s plant construction activities. The Pipe Technology Division covers the entire pipe production of our stock, project and special pipes, as well as pipe technology. Half of our production capacity for stainless steel welded pipes is supplied to our customers for demanding applications, while the other half serves as the basis for further processing into mechanically lined pipes or customised components. As already mentioned, we are constructing a completely new production hall for highly automated manufacturing in this area. In doing so, we are investing in the future of the Knesebeck site, creating space for growth and, at the same time, optimal conditions for efficient processes.”
Extensive stock on hand Given the enormous price pressure on the market at the moment, I was keen to explore what sets BUTTING apart in this difficult environment, particularly for pipes that are sold to customers outside the group.“ We are the first choice for customers who demand sophisticated specifications, tight deadlines and high reliability,” explains Mr Heinzle.“ At two production sites in Germany, we manufacture pipes from coil and plate. Thanks to our many years of expertise, we produce stainless steel pipes that precisely meet our customers’ requirements: immediately available, individually manufactured to specific requirements or as special solutions – and all in the highest quality. At the same time, our customers appreciate the variety of materials, dimensions and other customised solutions we offer. Another difference between other manufacturers and us is that we maintain our own extensive pipe warehouse in Knesebeck.”“ This large store of stock items means that BUTTING can fulfil short-term delivery requests from its warehouse, just as a stockist would,” explains Mr Heinzle.“ We have three objectives with the warehouse. Firstly, we use it to provide our dealers with reliable availability for their warehouses with delivery times of 1-2 weeks. Secondly, we also use the warehouse to supplement our project business. In addition, our warehouse enables us to produce economical
“ We take responsibility at the interfaces where projects typically run the risk of failure.”
batch sizes. Thanks to our two highperformance production lines for pipes from plate, we can also produce and deliver individual orders within 2-3 weeks based on our own stainless steel plate stock – we call this service Fast Track. At the same time, we are able to manufacture sophisticated pipes in special materials for a wide range of applications.”“ Our BUTTING Könnern site has been part of our corporate family since 2017. At that time, we were faced with the challenge that almost the entire capacity of our facilities in Knesebeck was being used for the production of clad pipes. We were unable to meet further requests for stainless steel welded pipes. For this reason, we decided to incorporate the former SOSTA company into our corporate family to continue meeting demand. Thanks to the production of our pipes at two different locations, we have been able to increasingly specialise our range over the years. BUTTING in Könnern now has extensive capacities in pipe production from coil and plate.”
EcoVadis Platinum status In June 2025, BUTTING was awarded platinum status by EcoVadis, placing it in the top 1 % of producers, reflecting
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