Nowadays more than 200 farmers belong to the 'family' SONNENTOR.

As a one-man company, the then 23-year-old, started to travel from farmer’s market to farmer’s market, selling his herbs. Soon, he became well known, not just because of his organic products which were a success, but also because of his traditional leather pants that he had inherited from his family, and round red glasses.
Slowly, he won over some farmers for his herb business. Grandma Zach, the Bauer family and Kurt Kainz were the first to believe in Johannes. Today, more than 200 farmers belong to the SONNENTOR Family.

One of the first SONNENTOR tea was the 'Good mood' tea (Gute Laune Tee).

Thirty years later, this herbal tea is still their favorite and their classic. The range has now steadily increased to 900 products. In addition to organic herbs, there are now bio-spices, bio-tea, bio-coffee, organic cocoa and more Sonnentor! Their specialty in the field of tea is their tea bags with extra-large herbs, so they contain many essential oils. This makes these teas very beneficial.

For Sonnentor plastic is only for Barbies

Approximately 80% of SONNENTORs' packaging materials consist of renewable raw materials. These include paper, cardboard, cellulose fibers and tea bags made from banana fiber and corn starch. The SONNENTOR tea bags consist of fibers of the textile banana (Abacá) and selected cellulose fibers of wood. Since 2016, the tea bags are unbleached, which gives them a brownish color..

Direct trade of tea and herbs with the main focus on people

Although SONNENTOR calls the Waldviertel 'home', the company also sees itself as 'a resident of the world', because its own region is limited in what it can produce. This is where partners around the world get involved. SONNENTOR has a regular exchange with farmers and their families in Romania, Albania, Nicaragua, Tanzania, New Zealand, China, Spain and Kosovo. There is direct trade, which goes beyond Fairtrade due to personal, sustainable relations with farmers and their families worldwide. There is a view of the entire cycle from sowing to harvesting to packaging..

5 Sonnentor core values:

The economy of the common good is an alternative economic system based on the same values which also enable human relationships to be successful. It focuses on principles beyond the financial balance. People its main Focus.

SONNENTOR’s core corporate values
Human dignity, solidarity, environmental sustainability, social justice, democratic participation and transparency form the five pillars with which the entrepreneurial success can be measured in a new and "different" way than before.

Live and let live, mutual respect and appreciation and fruitful cooperation is Sonnentor's philosophy..

Johannes Gutmann is now a successful businessman, but hardly changed. He still wears his round red glasses, his old leather pants and sticks to his principles. Instead of driving in a Porsche, he simply cycles to work.