REWE-ZENTRALFINANAN eG (RZF), the parent company of REWE Group, appointed its Supervisory Board members for the next four years at its Annual General Meeting in Kitzbühel on Monday (27 June). The Supervisory Board also re-elected Erich Stockhausen as Chairman.
New members on the Supervisory Board - Fritz Aupperle bid farewell and honoured by the DGRV
Chief Supervisor Erich Stockhausen with the new Supervisory Board members Lutz Richrath and Thomas Kunkel as well as with Mattias Peikert, who will hand over his seat to Kati Sommer during the term of office.
The company's Annual General Meeting unanimously elected all 10 shareholder representatives to the committee; the employee representatives had already been elected in the spring. The two REWE retailers Thomas Kunkel, member of the Management Board of REWE Süd/Südwest e.G., and Lutz Richrath, member of the Management Board of REWE West e.G., were elected to the Supervisory Board as new shareholder representatives. Following the Annual General Meeting, the Supervisory Board elected Erich Stockhausen as its Chairman for a third term of office, and Helmut Göttmann, Chairman of the General Works Council, was re-elected as Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board.
The retailers Fritz Aupperle (67) and Robert Schäfer (55) were dismissed from the Supervisory Board. The latter will continue to be involved with the Group as part of his committee work at REWE West e.G. Fritz Aupperle, who as the operator of 4 REWE stores in Swabia had been on the Supervisory Board of RZF since 2007 and who had been active on the committees of his home cooperative, REWE Süd/Südwest e.G., since 1987, was awarded the DGRV's Golden Badge of Honour, the highest award for special services in the German cooperative sector, at the REWE Group's annual conference. DGRV board member Andreas Schneider emphasised in particular that "Fritz Aupperle has made a significant contribution to cooperative commitment in Germany. As opinionated as we know him, he has played a key role in promoting and further developing cooperation between regional cooperatives. Fritz Aupperle is also characterised by the fact that he stood firmly by decisions made together and drove their implementation forward. His work has had a positive impact on the entire committee work and we would like to thank him most sincerely for this."
Fritz Aupperle (left) received the Golden Badge of Honour of the German Cooperative and Raiffeisen Confederation from DGRV board member Andreas Schneider
REWE Group Supervisory Board Chairman Erich Stockhausen honoured Aupperle: "As an extremely successful merchant, Fritz Aupperle has shaped and advanced REWE's independent retail business in the southwest like hardly anyone else. As a REWEer through and through, he always stood and still stands for the interests of the retailers as well as for the interests of the Group as a whole. I am happy and grateful to have had him as a valuable partner in our Supervisory Board team. He has rendered great service to REWE."
Annual financial statements 2021 confirmed - REWE Group publishes online annual report
The Annual General Meeting of REWE-ZENTRALFINANZ eG also approved the 2021 annual financial statement and unanimously discharged the company's Management Board and Supervisory Board.
The General Assembly met in Kitzbühel this year
With the approval of the annual financial statements, REWE Group also published its online annual report for 2021 under the title "WE - strong & diverse, creative & innovative, successful & transparent" on the website rewe-group-geschaeftsbericht.de as well as the online sustainability report
"Since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, we have focused not only on getting through the crisis as unscathed as possible, but also - wherever possible - on becoming even more efficient and stronger," explains Lionel Souque, CEO of the REWE Group. "This is why we are continuing to press ahead with the digitalisation of our business models and all processes within the company. We are also continuing to focus consistently on Sustainability and are specifically looking for further developments that will make our 95-year-old company fit for the future. Our 380,000 employees have given far more than their full commitment to this shared journey with all their expertise and passion - I would like to take this opportunity to thank each and every one of them. But the collaboration with and within our committees has also always been particularly constructive and focussed. This collaborative approach has enabled us to overcome the crises productively and successfully to date and provides us with the best prerequisites for continuing to do so. Our activities and results are comprehensively documented digitally in the annual and sustainability report," continued Souque.
The agenda included the election of new Supervisory Board members
In addition to the key economic figures for the business year and the milestones of the year, the annual report provides an insight into the REWE Group with various magazine articles. Examples include a presentation of the REWE Green Farming store in Wiesbaden Erbenheim, a look at digital travel management at DER Travel and Tourism and a description of how PENNY is succeeding in raising its profile. We also look at how PENNY in Romania and IKI in Lithuania are driving forward the topic of e-commerce and how Lekkerland's concepts for shop operators are being further developed.
All of these activities show how strong and diverse, creative and innovative, successful and transparent REWE Group was once again in 2021: with strong sales growth of around 2 billion euros, REWE Group also closed the 2021 financial year with economic success, once again demonstrating its strong performance under challenging conditions. External revenue from continuing operations rose by 2.5 per cent from 74.6 billion to 76.5 billion euros. The business of independent REWE retailers in Germany once again showed above-average positive development, achieving another increase of 4.8 per cent in the past financial year after sales growth of 20.5 per cent in 2020.
REWE Group's new online sustainability report was published at the same time: in accordance with the GRI Sustainability Reporting Standard, the company has been documenting its commitment to sustainability in the four pillars of its sustainability strategy since 2008: "Green Products", "Energy, Climate and Environment", "Employees" and "Social Commitment". in 2022, REWE Group achieved second place in the IÖW ranking as the best retailer for its online sustainability report for the 2020 financial year.
