Description
Speick is a family-owned natural cosmetics maker near Stuttgart, best known for its soaps and shaving products, whose whole range contains an extract of the Speick plant hand-picked in the Austrian Alps.
Walter Rau founded the company in Stuttgart in 1928 as a fine-soap works. It is now Speick Naturkosmetik GmbH & Co. KG, run by his grandson Wikhart Teuffel and great-grandson Valentin Teuffel, and everything is made at one site in Leinfelden-Echterdingen. The Speick plant grows wild at about 1,800 metres in the UNESCO Biosphere Park Nockberge in Carinthia. Local alpine farming families harvest it by hand between mid-August and mid-September, and the company says they pick it so that the plant can regrow.
The range covers soaps, shower gels, shaving soap and cream, deodorants, face and body care, sun care and refills, in several lines such as Natural Aktiv, Men and Thermal Sensitiv. In 2013 it was the first cosmetics brand to win the German Sustainability Award. Öko-Test rated its men’s face cream “sehr gut” in March 2020, its hair soap “sehr gut” in September 2020, and also its Thermal Sensitiv night cream. Its soaps are BDIH-certified, according to a retailer’s product sheet. Speick runs shops in Stuttgart and Konstanz and a factory outlet, has an online shop and is sold in drugstores such as dm.
Strengths
- It has been a family business in the Stuttgart area since 1928, making everything at one site.
- Several products, including a men’s face cream and a hair soap, were rated “sehr gut” by Öko-Test.
- The range includes solid soaps, shaving soap and refills, which use less packaging than products in bottles.
Weaknesses
- The website doesn’t name a natural cosmetics label for each product; it has to be checked on the pack or in a database.
- The pages read gave no prices, which are only in the separate online shop.
- The company doesn’t publish how much of the wild Speick plant is harvested each year.
Who it is for
People in Germany who wash, shave or care for their skin with drugstore products and want a natural cosmetics brand made by a family company in the region, with solid soaps among the choices.