WOW! World conquerer Pick winter salami is 150 years old

Márk Pick founded the business in 1869. The original receipt is still kept a secret, only the salami master knows it. In 2014, the 145th anniversary of the company’s birth Pick’s winter salami became a Hungaricum.

Márk Pick founded his business in 1869 in Szeged and by 1883 he already had Italian workers and produced salami in huge quantities while bulk manufacturing started in 1885. After his death in 1892, his widow and his brother-in-law took over the company – magyarorszagom.hu reported. 

The factory was placed near the Tisza in 1900 because the constantly low temperature provided a better environment for the maturation process. The oldest son of Márk, Jenő Pick, started to work in the factory in 1898 and became the director in 1906 with which a new era began in the History of Pick. They bought the nearby Tiani salami factory; thus, he acquired the whole riverside property. Jenő tried to modernise the production process; he also understood how the market works and how important advertising is.

In the first decade of the 20th century, the company’s main product became the winter salami. Between the two world wars, the factory was one of the most important companies of the Hungarian food industry and it also became

a worldwide known and fancied brand.

In 1935, at the Brussels World Fair, Pick won a diploma of merit. Jenő lead Pick alone after 1934 until the nationalisations of the Communist era. Though the company became state-owned, it remained under the professional guidance of the Pick family who was masters of salami making and

protected their secret recipe. 

The factory was modernised in the 1950s, allowing it to work during the whole year and produce other salami variants not only the famous winter one.

Today, Pick Szeged Zrt. has the largest dried meat manufacturing capacity in Central-Europe and its scope of activities covers the entire meat industry vertical from slaughtering to the wholesale and retail distribution of meat and meat products. Furthermore, they

actively export to 35 countries

and have a subsidiary company in Germany and a trade representation office in Japan.

Each year they produce nearly 40,000 tons of meat products. The selection includes premium products satisfying wide-ranging market needs: salamis and dry sausages, cold cuts, liver pastes, frankfurters and meat products made from the unique Mangalica pork. In fact, Pick is the largest Mangalica meat producing business in the world.

Source: magyarorszagom.hu, pick.hu