1907-1928

The Start of an Austrian Success Story

Paul Blagusz

Paul Blagusz was born on 13 January 1907 in Unterpullendorf, then western Hungary, later Austria's easternmost province of Burgenland. He attended Hungarian primary school for two years. When his father died, he moved as a shepherd boy to the area in south-eastern Lower Austria called the Bucklige Welt, where he proceeded to learn German.

 

From the age of 11, he worked on a farm in Pöttsching and began to sell Hungarian products at the market in Wiener Neustadt. In June 1926 Paul obtained his own permit to "trade in eggs, butter, poultry, game, fruit and mushrooms".

 

He transported goods of all kinds by train to the Naschmarkt, Vienna's largest open-air market. It was a tiresome and difficult task. That same year he managed to purchase a Perl lorry. As other tradesmen wanted to travel with him he began to arrange regular transports to Vienna.