In July, it was a year ago that the floods devastated large parts of the Ahr valley. Although the reconstruction is progressing well, the damage is still very present and clearly visible in many places. The house of Beatrix Schäfer-Hoffmann, an employee at REWE Schäfer in Bad Neuenahr, which stood in the small town of Dernau, also fell victim to the masses of water overnight. We wanted to know how she and her family are doing today, how she lives and what gives her hope. one visited her and her husband Wolfgang Hoffmann in their temporary home.
Flood disaster: How REWE Group helped
REWE Group retailers, store managers, store teams and administrators provided short-term and unbureaucratic help in response to the flood disaster in North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate in mid-July 2021. REWE, nahkauf, PENNY, Toom Baumarkt DIY store, Nahkauf and Lekkerland donated large quantities of food and other urgently needed everyday products directly on site in many affected cities and communities and provided helpers.
In addition, the retail company, which was itself affected by the flood disaster with 55 REWE, Nahkauf and PENNY stores, provided support in the form of donations:
- REWE Group implemented a flood relief fund for affected colleagues - REWE Group employees and retailers supported this with 470,000 euros.
- REWE also contributed to the "Ein Herz für Kinder" (Bild hilft e.V.) fundraising campaign - with a donation totalling one million euros. The campaign channelled a total of 3.7 million euros into the reconstruction of children's facilities such as daycare centres, schools, playgrounds and sports grounds in the particularly affected regions.
- Deposit donations in some REWE regions raised 61,000 euros for the DRK's flood relief efforts.
In July 2021, PENNY called on customers to donate to the flood victims and tripled the amount raised. As a result, a total of around 1.35 million euros was made available to the DRK flood relief organisation.
From mid-October to the end of December 2021, Toom Baumarkt DIY store customers had the opportunity to round up their purchases to the nearest whole euro amount. The rounded-up amounts collected were then donated to charitable organisations for reconstruction. A total of 20,000 euros was collected, which Toom rounded up to 50,000 euros.
