5 Pfennig - Leipzig-Plagwitz Grohmann and Frosch

Grohmann & Frosch was a Leipzig-Plagwitz textile firm that issued notgeld tokens during the acute small-change shortages of the First World War, when the German public began hoarding copper and nickel coins almost immediately after mobilization in 1914. Industrial employers across Saxony resorted to privately struck zinc pieces to pay out small wage increments and canteen credits, zinc being one of the few metals both available and legally tolerable for emergency private issues.

The Plagwitz district, then a dense industrial suburb west of Leipzig proper, was absorbed into the city only in 1910.