Zahnräderfabrik Augsburg — a precision gear manufacturer incorporated as a joint-stock company from the earlier sole proprietorship of Johann Renk — issued zinc notgeld tokens during the acute small-change shortage that gripped Germany in the early 1920s. Many industrial firms across Bavaria minted their own scrip during this period simply to pay workers in denominations the Reichsbank could no longer supply in sufficient quantity. Zinc was the material of necessity, not preference; copper and nickel had been absorbed by wartime requisitions and postwar metal shortages left manufacturers with few alternatives.
Zahnräderfabrik Augsburg — a precision gear manufacturer incorporated as a joint-stock company from the earlier sole proprietorship of Johann Renk — issued zinc notgeld tokens during the acute small-change shortage that gripped Germany in the early 1920s. Many industrial firms across Bavaria minted their own scrip during this period simply to pay workers in denominations the Reichsbank could no longer supply in sufficient quantity. Zinc was the material of necessity, not preference; copper and nickel had been absorbed by wartime requisitions and postwar metal shortages left manufacturers with few alternatives.