A few weeks ago there was still optimism at Lichtung Verlag. At a lavish book premiere in Passau, the audience celebrated Bernhard Setzwein’s new novel “Kafka’s Journey through the Hunchbacked World”. Then we went on to the Leipzig Book Fair, and the current sales figures reveal that the publisher has once again achieved a direct hit. But then bad news arrived that ruined the Easter holidays for the Lichtung team. “The news hit us out of the blue,” says Eva Bauernfeind, one of the two managing directors of the Viechtach-based publishing house. The company is threatened with extinction due to a reassessment by the German pension insurance company. According to Bauernfeind, the small publisher cannot afford the required additional payment of almost 40,000 euros. In any case, bankruptcy would mean the end, says Bauernfeind.
The publisher has received great popularity in the past few days. “This gives us renewed confidence,” says Bauernfeind, who is still at a loss when it comes to the pension insurance’s demands. “This all came without warning.” The pension insurance company is audited every four years. So far there have never been any complaints. But now the employment of the managing directors has been reassessed. The previously common separation of managing director activities and project work is no longer accepted.
Obviously, Lichtung Verlag is not an isolated case. Several cultural businesses from the surrounding area have now reported to Bauernfeind that they are in similar difficulties. Everyone has slowly worked their way up from small beginnings. Lichtung Verlag arose from an initiative in 1987, when an association was founded on the initiative of Hubert Ettl to publish a critical cultural magazine and books. Three years later, Lichtung Verlag was founded as a GmbH.
The then managing director Ettl was employed on a part-time basis for his work. Project work for the magazine clearing and books in the publishing house were billed as freelancers on a fee basis. This division continued when Eva Bauernfeind and Kristina Pöschl took over management in 2014. You work freelance for the publisher and other companies. The publisher reported all fees to the Artists’ Social Fund (KSK) and paid the fees, says Bauernfeind.
This was fine until 2019. Since 2023, however, the pension insurance has required that the managing directors must be uniformly employed as employees and that all amounts must be paid through the publisher, retroactively until 2019. “This is particularly painful for us,” says Bauernfeind.
Publisher founder Hubert Ettl is also annoyed by this approach. “The pension insurance company is reassessing a situation that it has accepted for 30 years and then retroactively demands a sum that is horrendous for us. And this without warning. In doing so, it is destroying a small publishing house.”
The program includes prose and poetry, photo books as well as reading and non-fiction books
“We don’t want to give up,” says Eva Bauernfeind. The company was managed stably. They even survived the Corona years well. Especially because all employees showed great commitment despite low salaries. “What we are doing borders on self-exploitation,” asserts Bauernfeind. But companies could hardly survive otherwise in the shrinking publishing industry.
Lichtung Verlag’s program includes prose and poetry, photo books as well as reading and non-fiction books. For this, the publisher received the Free State of Bavaria’s Prize for a Bavarian Small Publisher in 2010, the Ministry of Science and Art’s Publishing Prize in 2020 and the Regen District’s Culture Prize.
The next issue of the culture magazine clearing, which is funded through ads and subscriptions, is coming soon. But book production must be stopped. Only those projects that are already underway will be continued. The publisher is now hoping for solidarity campaigns and donations. “Since it was founded, it has been shown again and again that many supporters have great appreciation for the company,” says managing director Kristina Pöschl.
The initial aim is to sell rescue book packages (poetry, prose and illustrated books). In addition to donations, a subscription or gift subscription to the magazine is also useful clearingsays Bauernfeind (Tel. 09942/2711 or [email protected]). Further information on the publisher’s website: lichtung-verlag.de.