THE POSTCARD ALBUM

POSTCARD PRINTER & PUBLISHER RESEARCH

 TPA ARCHIVES    

SCo N

Company name: Serz & Co.

Address: Albrecht Dürerstr. 26 (1898/1907) – Bucherstr. 76 (1913)

In business from: 

July 1, 1837 until c. mid 1930’s

Printer:  yes   Publisher:  yes

Means of production / workforce:

2 letterpress, 10 copperplate engraving presses, 30 workers (1907) – 12 letterpress, 5 copperplate engraving presses, 70 workers (1913) – 100 workers (1921) – 12 letterpress, 3 litho, 1 offset press, 230 workers (1925) – 8 letterpress, 8 hand-presses, 3 litho, 2 hand-presses, 120 workers (1928) – workforce down to 48 persons by 1935

Trademark(s):

see illustration

Specialised in:

pre-1900: mostly articles of religious nature – post-1900: greeting/subject postcards and holy pictures – post-1925: mostly calendars, but still holy pictures, general printing

Notes: Old firm that was run by the Serz family until 1925, then taken over by Ludwig Loeffz and Mich. Fritz Erlanger who turned the company into a calendar factory. Serz entered the postcard business quite late (around 1906) according to my actual knowledge. All cards (greetings, women, children etc.) seen so far were printed by halftone process, many in very good quality, some almost real photo-like. An advert from 1913 mentions their “Bromersa” postcard quality = bromide photo imitation with or without glossy finish, monochrome (as most of their cards) or coloured. Serz & Co. printed also some local Nuremberg topo cards.

Illustrations (from top):

Photo of Gottlieb Wilhelm Serz dating from c. 1908. Head of the company together with his mother Friederike Serz.

Serz card no. 612, Christmas greetings, p/u Dec. 1914.

Serz card no. 0154, p/u 1911 in Denmark.

A so-called ‘Effekt’ card design published by ‘Hermes’ publishing company also from Nuremberg. This is card no. 0351 from series 10 and printed by Serz. The ‘Effekt’ cards (the black background in matt look) were available in 3 colours: red, blue and green. Some 100 different designs published. Not p/u, pre-1914.

Serz card no. 0150, woman with spring flowers. Machine-coloured (‘Autochrom’). P/u (Fieldpost) Oct. 1916.

Serz card no. 0460. Whitsun greetings with German Imperial colours, p/u as fieldpost in 1917. The same card might had been published earlier without flag colours.

Another ‘Hermes’ published card (no card number, signed ‘Jemueller’) printed by Serz & Co. It is series ‘G’, 6 different patriotic views with slogans. Hermes (internal) series number 9, no. 10 were the same designs but with Whitsun greetings instead patriotic slogans. Not p/u, likely dating from early 1915 or 1916.

Verlagsanstalt Hermes was in fact a daughter company of Serz & Co. = the publishing dept. in form a a separate limited company under same address.

Promotinal imprint with prices listed found on address side of illustrated WW1 card.