Planned publishers’ merger

The Dornach publishers Rudolf Steiner Verlag and Verlag am Goetheanum are planning to merge. They hope to gain strength from the resulting synergies for the challenging situation of the book market.

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In 1908 Marie Steiner founded the anthroposophical movement’s first press in Berlin (DE). It was called Philosophisch-Anthroposophischer Verlag and out of it grew the two present publishers, Rudolf Steiner Verlag and Verlag am Goetheanum. The two companies, which are currently neighbours, now want to join forces and merge by summer 2025 to use the resulting synergies in a situation that has been difficult for the book market for years.

The Goetheanum press will transfer its book stock and rights to the limited company Rudolf Steiner Verlag and become a shareholder with a seat on the board of directors. The identity and brand of each publisher will be retained and both will in future be managed under the umbrella of the publishing group Philosophisch-Anthroposophische Verlage (commercially a public limited company).

Johannes Onneken, managing director of Rudolf Steiner Verlag since 2024, will also head the new company, while Thomas Didden, managing director of Verlag am Goetheanum, will retire. Christiane Haid and Justus Wittich will oversee future publishing programmes on behalf of the Goetheanum in cooperation with the new publishing group.

In future, Rudolf Steiner’s works which are published by the Rudolf Steiner estate administration (Nachlassverwaltung) will then again be issued by a company that also brings out anthroposophical literature arising from activities at the Goetheanum and within the School of Spiritual Science.

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