After a long break, the popular VW currywurst will soon be back on the menu in the VW canteen in the Wolfsburg board building. This was last meat-free. Since August 7, the restaurant, which is also used by assembly line workers, has been offering meat and fish again, a spokeswoman said. So nothing stands in the way of a comeback for the currywurst.
The spokeswoman left it open for the time being when the sausage would be served again for the first time. But it is already certain that the vegan version of the sausage will remain in the program.
The decision to switch the canteen in the so-called brand high-rise in Wolfsburg to meat-free food caused a stir two years ago. In particular, former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder’s reaction to the “power bar for skilled workers in production” fueled a debate about meat consumption in companies at the time. “If I were still on the #VW supervisory board, there would have been no such thing,” Schröder wrote on Linkedin.
“It’s not against the currywurst,” it said at the time
The ban from the company restaurant in Wolfsburg never diminished demand for the VW currywurst. Despite the corona pandemic and the switch to vegan cuisine, sales of the factory meat product even increased, according to VW last year. VW had defended the decision at the time. “It doesn’t go against the currywurst, which is still offered in all other canteens at the plant,” said Nils Potthast, then head of VW gastronomy. After all, VW has more than 30 canteens and kiosks in the factory and the currywurst remained in the program in all the others. During the pandemic, VW even introduced a delivery service so that employees working from home could get their currywurst. In the end, as VW said at the time, even more currywurst were sold than before the pandemic.
When he took office a year ago, VW brand boss Thomas Schäfer revealed that he was a fan of the classic car. “Let’s have a currywurst!” he said in July 2022 at the end of his welcome video. Works council chief Daniela Cavallo had even promoted the meat product at the works meeting a few days earlier: “It’s best to take a pack of currywurst and ketchup home with you,” she said in June 2022 in her speech to the workforce.
With the return of meat and fish to the last vegan canteen in the brand high-rise, VW says it responded to an employee survey earlier this year. “Following the wishes of the workforce, the company restaurant in the brand high-rise has been offering an additional component with fish or meat since August 7th, 2023, in addition to the vegan and vegetarian dishes,” says the spokeswoman. This is intended to enable groups in which only individual employees want to eat vegan to visit the canteen. This should also relieve other canteens to which such groups have had to switch in the past.