10 Pfennigs - Leipzig Tricotagenfabrik

Leipzig's textile industry relied heavily on scrip coinage during the Wilhelmine and Weimar periods, when labor-intensive factories paid workers partly in tokens redeemable only at company stores — a system that tied wages to the employer's own retail margins. The Leipziger Tricotagenfabrik, a knitted goods manufacturer, issued zinc tokens of this type when metal shortages and wartime economic disruption made small-denomination Reichsmark coinage chronically unavailable for making change.

Zinc was the material of necessity, not preference — chosen because copper and nickel were diverted to military use during both world wars.