Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag

What Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag does

Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag is a privately held, owner-managed (inhabergeführtes Unternehmen) regional publishing house headquartered in Suhl-Heinrichs, Thuringia, Germany. Founded in 1992, the company has operated for over 30 years as an independent producer of print and online media for the Südthüringen and Oberfranken regions. Its portfolio combines self-published titles — the tourism journal RennsteigBlick (in publication for over 20 years), the monthly regional newspaper Treffpunkt, the daily-updated Treffpunkt Online, the seasonal Der Weihnachtsbote, and annual wall/desk calendars — with bespoke publishing services delivered to external clients.

The company serves four primary customer segments: tourism boards, hotels and hospitality operators; large housing companies (Wohnungswirtschaft) requiring tenant-communication media; municipalities and associations needing commemorative publications, city maps and citizen information; and local businesses purchasing advertising across the publisher's owned titles. Revenue is generated through advertising sales in the publisher's own media (across print and online), fees for custom design/print/publishing projects (brochures, guest guides, city maps, commemorative booklets, tenant newspapers), and calendar/map distribution sold as promotional gifts. Production capabilities are anchored by an in-house photography stack built over decades — a digital image archive captured on professional Canon EOS R5/R6 mirrorless systems with L-series optics and DJI Mavic II Pro aerial platforms.

Go-to-market is sales-led: a small team of field-based media consultants conduct on-site client meetings across the Südthüringen/Oberfranken footprint, with each consultant assigned a fixed existing customer base from which to expand new advertising accounts. Pricing is quote-based and not publicly disclosed; contracts are typically multi-year. The company employed 1–10 people as of the most recent signal (a January 2025 permanent hire for an additional media consultant) and reports no institutional investors, parent entities, or M&A activity in the data.

Name

Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag

Legal name

Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag

Website

https://www.rhoen-rennsteig-verlag.de

Company type

Private

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag is an owner-managed regional German publishing house in Suhl-Heinrichs, Thuringia, producing print and online media and custom publications for tourism boards, housing companies, municipalities, and local businesses in Südthüringen and Oberfranken.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Regional Publishing Services

NAICS

Periodical Publishers (51312), Newspaper, Periodical, Book, and Directory Publishers (5131), Commercial Photography (541922)

SIC

Periodicals: Publishing Or Publishing & Printing (2721), Books: Publishing Or Publishing & Printing (2731), Services-Mailing, Reproduction, Commercial Art & Photography (7330)

akta.pro primary industry

Alternative/Independent Newsweeklies & Opinion Press (MPAJADAH)

akta.pro secondary industry

Travel & Outdoors Magazines (MPAJAEAH)

Keywords

• Regional publishing services
• Custom publication services
• Tourism journal publishing
• Graphic design services
• Aerial photography services

Headquarters

HQ city

Suhl

HQ country

Germany

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Technology or R&D

Revenue model

1. Advertising Revenue: Selling print and online advertising space in the company's own publications (newspapers, journals, calendars, city maps) to businesses wanting to reach regional audiences.
2. Custom Publication Services: Producing customer-commissioned publications including tourist journals, government guides, info brochures, anniversary booklets, tenant newspapers, and graphic services. Revenue is generated through client payments for design, printing, and publishing services.
3. Calendar and Map Sales: Annual wall and desk calendars sold or distributed as promotional gifts for business customers' marketing purposes.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels3 records

Core offering

Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag is an owner-operated regional publishing house based in Suhl-Heinrichs, Germany, producing its own newspapers, tourism journals, calendars, and city maps, as well as commissioned custom publications (brochures, commemorative booklets, tenant newspapers, info guides) for clients in tourism, housing, municipal, and association sectors. The company additionally offers professional photography services (including UAV/drone aerial photography) and graphic design and cartography services as a one-stop media partner from concept to finished product.

Product overview

Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag is an owner-managed publishing house with over 30 years of experience, offering a comprehensive portfolio of print and online media products. The core offerings include own newspapers and publications (RennsteigBlick, Treffpunkt, Treffpunkt Online, Der Weihnachtsbote, Kalender), supplemented by professional service offerings for housing companies (Mieterinformationsmedien), tourism and hospitality sectors (brochures, guides, maps), municipalities and associations (Festschriften, commemorative publications), and photography services including UAV/drone capabilities. The company also provides graphic design and cartography services, serving as a one-stop partner for communication needs from idea to finished product.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Treffpunkt
• RennsteigBlick The largest tourist journal for the Thuringian Forest and Rennsteig region, providing current information on events, excursion destinations, and attractions, distributed as an advertising-supported publication.

Quantifiable outcome

• One of the largest tourism journals in the region (20+ years of RennsteigBlick)

Named customers5 records

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles4 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature2 records

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• Städte Zella-Mehlis, Oberhof, Suhl, Schleusingen und OrtsteileminorStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 January 2022Collaborative city map project published in the anniversary year 2022, uniting the planned upper center of Southern Thuringia (Südthüringen) into a single cartographic work.

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves4 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Frankenpost Verlag: Regional newspaper publisher based in Hof, Upper Franconia — directly overlapping with Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag's Oberfranken footprint and serving the same small-market regional newspaper model with local advertising and custom publications.
• Thüringer Allgemeine Verlag: Regional daily newspaper publisher based in Erfurt covering Thuringia — directly comparable regional print-and-online publisher serving a comparable mix of advertising, custom publishing, and local B2B customers in the same state.

Broad incumbents

• Südwestdeutsche Medienholding (SWMH): Large German regional media group operating multiple regional newspapers and digital outlets — comparable in product mix (regional newspapers, advertising platforms, custom publishing) but at substantially larger scale and broader geographic reach.
• Funke Mediengruppe: Major German regional media group publishing local newspapers, magazines, and digital outlets across multiple states — broad incumbent offering overlapping capabilities in regional print, advertising sales, and custom publication services.
• ADAC Verlag: Publisher of tourism-oriented media including travel guides, maps, and magazines — comparable as a publisher monetizing tourism audiences via advertising and content products, though at national scale and with much broader distribution.
• Baedeker (MairDumont): Long-established travel guide and map publisher — comparable in producing travel/tourism content and cartographic products, but operating nationally/internationally rather than for a single German region.

Emerging players

• Marco Polo Travel Publishing: Travel-focused publisher producing guides and journals for regional tourism markets — comparable in publishing tourism content with regional/local advertising tie-ins, though more specialized and digitally oriented.

Others

• PicturePeople: Chain of professional photography studios offering commercial and portrait photography services — adjacent comparator for Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag's in-house photography business (advertising photos, hotel/gastronomy imagery, UAV/drone shoots).

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Rhön-Rennsteig-Verlag