Enne Burda: A Success Story

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"A miracle can be done with your own hands!" - Enne Burda loved to repeat. Her whole life is an excellent confirmation of these words.

At first glance, her life may seem like a wonderful fairy tale: a girl from a simple family has become a world-famous entrepreneur and one of the most prominent figures in the fashion industry. But this is only at first glance! In fact, she did not have a good fairy who, with a wave of a magic wand, turned Cinderella into a princess. Enne Burda's dizzying career was made possible only thanks to her hard work, perseverance and determination. "I want to!" - These words have been her motto since childhood. And what she wanted, she sought - so it went on all her life.

Childhood

Anna Magdalena Lemminger was born on July 28, 1909 in the provincial town of Offenburg in southern Germany in the family of a driver.

Even as a young girl, she decided that she would not live like her parents - because she deserves the best! Mother, a modest housewife, was never an example for Anna.

Maternal patience and constant readiness for self-sacrifice caused a hidden protest in the girl, she instinctively felt that these qualities would only interfere with her and would not allow her to break up. Like many other career-oriented women, she was a "father's child." She rarely spoke with her mother, but her father, in her words, “loved madly,” and he paid her with the same strong love.

Youth

After graduating from the monastery school and receiving a certificate of maturity, Anna took a one-year course at a commercial school and went to work as a cashier at a city power station. One of her responsibilities was to accept payments from local entrepreneurs for electricity. Due to this circumstance, a meeting took place that became fateful for her: one day she met the owner of a small printing house, Franz Burda, a young and ambitious businessman. Franz was fascinated by Enne, and on July 9, 1931, young people played a wedding.

Enne gave birth to her husband three sons - Franz (in 1932), Frieder (in 1936) and Hubert (in 1940). Things went well with her husband, and the family could afford a lot. It would seem, what more could a poor provincial girl wish for? However, Enne did not like the role of the wife of a wealthy entrepreneur, she wanted more - success, power, filled with events of life. She firmly believed that this miracle would ever happen. More precisely, she will create it with her own hands, without outside help. And so it happened!

Carier start

In 1949, Enne Burda’s dream began to come true: her husband bought and transferred under her sole leadership a small, declining magazine publisher in the nearby town of Lara. Enne Burda rolled up her sleeves and set to work: she decided to create her own fashion magazine. The first edition was located in a small hall of one of the city zucchini. The room was cramped, but sufficient so that Enne Burda could fully develop her entrepreneurial talent in it.Having at her disposal several tailors and only one editor, she soon earned her first money.

Success and worldwide recognition

The idea underlying her Burda Moden magazine - to help a woman find her own unique style and sew fashionable and elegant clothes herself - hit the nail on the bucket! The magazine immediately became successful. Its starting circulation was 100 thousand copies, and two years later it reached half a million. In 1950, Burda Moden was sold in all German-speaking countries - Germany, Austria and Switzerland, since 1952 - in eight more European countries in the respective languages, and since 1953 - in the USA, Canada, Argentina and Brazil. Today it is published in 16 languages and sold in more than 90 countries.

Enne Burda in the USSR

One of the most outstanding achievements of Enne Burda was the conclusion of an agreement with the Government of the USSR in 1987 on the publication of Burda Moden in Russian. Burda Moden was the first Western magazine to appear in the Soviet Union, and a prime example of the ongoing democratic change in the country. The then Foreign Minister of Germany, Hans-Dietrich Genscher, told Enne Burda: "You have done more than the three German ambassadors before you."

The first release of Burda Moden in Russian
“A miracle can be done with your own hands,” Enne Burda often repeated. Having started her entrepreneurial career at age 40, she always went her own way and made key decisions herself. Independent, purposeful and fearless, Enne Burda has achieved fantastic success. Evidence of this is the modern media empire of Burda, at the origins of which it stood.

You can find out how Burda magazine is being created these days from an interview with Dagmar Bili, editor-in-chief of the German magazine Burda, and from a photo report from the scene.

Text: Marianna Makarova, photo: Burda Publishing House archive

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