After his secondary school graduation, Sebastian Aigner first completed his military service. Then his brother arose his curiosity about tanning, and he first applied for professional training in that field, but then chosed another profession.

Intrigued, Mr Aigner learned about the tanning profession on the internet (at www.lederpedia.de), which led him to apply for an internship at BADER. There he made the decision to become a tanner and after a successful application at BADER, he began his professional training at the Kerschensteiner School in Reutlingen. Since BADER is a fully integrated tannery, he didn’t need to collect practical experience in other training companies. Mr Aigner was pleased with his training and the ideas he had about tanning proved to be true in his practical activity.

In particular, he is fascinated by the variety of leather products as well as the varied chemistry connected to leather production.

Currently, Mr Aigner is working as a deputy head of the shaving unit and the shipping department, and decides largely independently on the selection of consignments for transmission to the finishing plant within the company and also on when shaved consignments should go for tanning.

Mr Aigner is eager to set further qualifications and to take over the management of departments.

He finds the diversity of its activities fascinating as well as the fact that each type of leather has a different touch as a natural product. He also enjoys the sense of family community facilitated by the small size of the industry.

To the question whether he would choose again to be a tanner, he bluntly answers: Naturally! For me, producing leather is a fascinating magic, especially because we often don’t know what is going on when a skin becomes leather and why!"