Our founder, Helmuth Senfter, was born into an Italian family with 160 years of experience in the cultural world of Salumi, a business initiated by his great-great-great grandfather in 1857. After himself working for the leading Italian Salumi Group for 22 years, he decided to start a new chapter in his life. Already living in China since 1995, Helmuth has chosen his second homeland for a fresh beginning: building his new Salumi venture, his family, his dream.

Hence our fundamentals at ISU are built on heritage, on bringing back to life old and sometimes lost traditional craft manufacturing from hundreds of years of history. While we were born to respect and follow this knowledge, our idea of knowledge is alive: We believe in traditions, but not in routine. We discover, learn and share new ways of doing old things – off the beaten path of industry mass production.

At ISU we are independent, ISU does not belong to any of the big multi-national corporation. That is why we are not in competition between size and product quality, bound by the imperative of mass production in its infinite seek of cutting costs. Just the opposite, it is our small size that allow us to peruse and create the best standards. We are not blocked by layers of corporate bureaucracy super large corporations have, instead we are open to new ideas, agility is what drives us.

Genuine product quality used to be a reality in the long distance past before the industrial revolution took place and heavy machinery was invented. In ISU we believe that superior genuine product quality will resurrect again through the means of ISU sustainable way of interacting with the environment and nature. That is why it makes so much sense for ISU to go back hundreds of years in history to discover old traditional craft manufacturing methods and to bring them back to life.

The actual understanding behind the word Salumi is simply “salted meats” (deriving from the Latin word “sal” for "salt") – these materials fresh meat and salt are the two main elements composing traditional Salumi. In Italy, during the Classic Age, Greek and Roman civilization were on their rise and driven by a sophisticated lifestyle and (culinary) culture. The Romans' search for excellence created the space for Salumi craftsmanship and the Art of Butchery to develop to extraordinary levels. Over the many centuries since the Classic Age – Salumi varieties enhanced quite a bit as a result of the spices trade between East and West through the famous Silk Route. Crafts preserved over centuries in Italy by the existence of Salumi craftsman called “Norcino”. The Salumi culture in Italy is coined into the people’s DNA caused from the long tradition which started more than 2000 years ago.