Three generations, two businesswomen, one goal: to live and love retail. Former REWE businesswoman Gudrun Glock, her daughter and successor Katja Fiedler and granddaughter Johanna Fiedler talk about how they came to REWE, how they successfully manage stores, family and committee work - and why ironing sometimes helps to clear your head. From the amazement of western managers after reunification to the Corona crisis, from young talent and networking, from their own courage and their wishes for REWE - being a businesswoman means responsibility, creativity, communication - and how varied it can be to do the same thing day after day.
Gudrun Glock founded Glock OHG in Suhl, Thuringia, after reunification in 1991. Katja Fiedler joined in 1993, and in 1997 she took over a second store in the immediate neighbourhood. In October 2015, Gudrun Glock handed over to her daughter Katja Fiedler and retired. Her younger daughter Kristin Naumann is also a saleswoman with a store near Marburg in Hesse.
Gudrun Glock : My past is closely linked to the GDR. I trained as an industrial clerk and then studied domestic trade in the GDR at the Leipzig Graduate School of Management, which can be compared to a degree in economics. After graduating, I worked for 20 years in the state-run food trade in the city and district of Suhl. After reunification, I transferred the business to REWE and spent two years as managing director of Einzelhandels GmbH HO Hungen. In principle, I dissolved, privatised and sold what I had built up 20 years earlier. A task whose end was in sight. It was clear to me that we had to become independent with a large chain, we couldn't have done it alone. At the time, there were many offers from the industry to set up a sales force in the East. But that didn't interest me. I had two children, our youngest was just starting school. As a sales representative, I would always have been away. And I was more of a market person. When the first stores were privatised, I said: Just give me a store. If it goes well, it's good. If it goes wrong, then that's it.
Katja Fiedler : When I finished school right at the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989/90, the world was suddenly a different place. in 1991, my mum started her own business with her first store, and in 1993 - after my training as a hotel manager - I joined her and really went through everything REWE had to offer at the time: Apprenticeship as a businesswoman, retail specialist, store management assistant, experience in other stores. There were and are many great training opportunities at REWE.
Johanna Fiedler: I've known REWE since I was a child. I helped and worked here in the store from an early age. But it wasn't my first plan to end up at REWE. I studied to be a teacher in Hesse and worked in a REWE-Marktplatz there. When I no longer wanted to continue my studies, I went through the REWE school-leaver programme and graduated as a retail specialist in Thuringia. Now I work as a store assistant in Apolda.
Katja Fiedler: Of course I can well imagine Johanna joining us. But she has to decide for herself. There are so many opportunities at REWE. I myself always had the idea that I had to find something that would fulfil me until I retired and that would be fun. Actually, everything in a store always revolves around the same thing: food, customers... But no two years have ever been the same. We always have new projects, plus external challenges: corona, war, delivery situations that have to be mastered. Trade is change, the saying really is true.
Gudrun Glock: What I've always particularly enjoyed: You have a lot to do with people. You listen to the personal stories of customers and employees. In my 25 years at the store, for example, I have trained many young people who are now retailers themselves. I'm a bit proud of that. And I also liked handling the goods. My husband always used to say: 'You always tidy everything up in the morning and in the evening you're happy when everything is a real mess. And the next morning you start again. That makes you happy
Katja Fiedler : In our early years, at the beginning of the 1990s, there were many more jobseekers. We always had enough applications. Today, we have to be more creative and think about how we can get people interested in careers in retail. Everyone is looking for new talent, which makes it difficult. We go to the local trainee fair and use the IHK's trainee speed dating programme. As part of the IHK Thüringen training programme, we have taken on a trainee from Vietnam who has already completed her first year of training. She is very eager to learn and quick on the uptake, but the German language is a major challenge. One of our mini-jobbers originally wanted to study, but now he's starting with us as a commercial specialist because he enjoyed it so much.
Johanna Fiedler: Most of the people in my retail management class used to have a student job in a supermarket and therefore decided to pursue a career there. Especially when you do your A-levels, retail is not your first thought. Also because you don't know what there is to do here and what opportunities there are for school leavers.
Gudrun Glock: In a comparison of all REWE regions, the proportion of female shop assistants is highest in REWE East, but it is also declining there. We girls and women didn't have to worry so much about work-life balance in the GDR. My daughters went to nursery school and there was after-school care. That meant we women could go to work. In GDR times, retail was in the hands of women, right up to management level. We often had to laugh at the bewildered faces of retail managers from the West who came after reunification and marvelled: 'We're only dealing with women here'.
„Motivation has always been an important quality for me: other people, but also myself.“ Gudrun Glock
Gudrun Glock: For one thing, women often have great respect for the financial responsibility that retailers bear for their employees, for their families and for themselves. They also need partners who tolerate the working hours and take care of the children on an equal footing. If the family environment doesn't play along, it is particularly difficult for a young businesswoman in the family phase to reconcile children and market responsibility.
Generation two: Daughter Katja Fiedler has been managing the two stores in Suhl ever since. The third generation is already waiting in the wings. | Photo: Achim Bachhausen
Katja Fiedler: In our case, for example, the family background was there. I was able to take a year off for each of my two children, as my mum took over at the store during that time. When she spent a lot of time at the head office in Cologne as a member of the Supervisory Board, I had her back. I was also able to rely on my partner and grandparents. And: you can trust children to do a lot, they quickly become independent. I know that from my own childhood, and my children know that. In my eyes, that's the right thing to do, because ultimately you want them to start life as independent people.
Johanna Fiedler: My brother and I usually went to sports after school, and that's where my friends were. At home, we often cooked in advance or took something to school. My mother and grandmother showed me that you can have both: family and running a market. But as a woman, you certainly think more about whether and how you can juggle everything.
Katja Fiedler: When the children were ill, I often did my office work from home. But most of it happens in the shop, and in the end you're the one with the responsibility. We have 70 employees. The main priority is to keep the shop running, the goods arriving, the customers coming, so that the earnings of these 70 employees are secured. The focus is always on looking after everyone.
Gudrun Glock: Being a shop assistant is not a nine-to-five job. That has to be clear. Even if you're not always in the store, you're always responsible
„Actually, everything in a market always revolves around the same thing. But no two years have ever been the same.“ Katja Fiedler
Gudrun Glock: We always had the plan that Katja would take over. So the handover was planned well in advance and we celebrated its completion with great fanfare. Celebrities from the Cologne head office, regional managers, sales representatives, suppliers, local politicians, regional television... Among other things, Katja and I used our joint speech to present REWE - and to introduce our co-operative principle, which is not so well known to the public. We wanted to show this handover of the baton: The future of REWE Glock is secure.
Katja Fiedler: " We deliberately kept the name Glock. Because for 25 years, customers simply went to REWE Glock. I was born a Glock, and we wanted continuity..
Gudrun Glock: ...and to continue what I had built up by consolidating the name. With this official handover, I also wanted to make it clear: I've handed over the business and I'm out. I thought it was very important to create clear conditions for the employees, for Katja and for me. Letting go is important. I was looking forward to the day when I no longer had any responsibilities and could do what we wanted with my husband. And I still enjoy that. But of course I always enjoyed everything, I liked the committee work, the busy diary, this "here today, there tomorrow".
Gudrun Glock : I was elected to the Supervisory Board of REWE Hungen in 1993 as a representative of Thuringia. That's how it started. Then came Cologne in 2006, then this great start to REWEformer, the Munich Declaration in 2009. During these years, we turned REWE on its head, and I was very involved as a member of the Management Board of REWE Hungen eG. Until then, we had tended to implement orders. Then we said: the retailers have to be in charge. Things were boiling. We took that on board and tried to implement it. To this day, I am happy and proud of how the cooperative has developed since then. But I still criticise the fact that there are far too few women on the supervisory boards. For many years, there were only two women on the Supervisory Board. There should definitely be more women on this board. Because the vast majority of REWE employees are women. We are a women's company ruled by men. The presence of women on supervisory boards would be an important step that women, i.e. businesswomen, should take.
Katja Fiedler: I am also involved, but externally with the aim of campaigning for the interests of Thuringian retailers. I am an ambassador for Public Affairs for the eastern region. This means I am also present in the regional SAS circle. And this results in contacts with local politics and the local economy as well as other honorary positions. I sit on the executive committee of the South Thuringia Chamber of Commerce and I am treasurer of the Thuringia Trade Association. I always tell new REWE retailers how important it is to approach people. Networking, striking up conversations with strangers, presenting yourself and your interests - that's something you can learn. As a Public Affairs ambassador, for example, I learnt how to keep a conversation going with politicians and ask the right questions.
The second generation: Granddaughter Johanna Fiedler currently works as a store assistant at a REWE in Apolda. | Photo: Achim Bachhausen
Johanna Fiedler: As a child, I thought: She can do it, she does it. But I learnt from her and from my grandmother that you can learn it all. You just have to practise it. I don't have to worry, even if I might not have the confidence to do it yet.
Gudrun Glock: You do need a bit of self-confidence...
Katja Fiedler:...and enjoy communicating. And always think: What can happen to me? Incidentally, the seminars on offer help enormously.
„I learnt a lot about self-confidence and being a woman from my grandma. That has shaped me. I think it's great to have two strong women in front of me.“ Johanna Fiedler
Pioneers and companions: Johanna Fiedler, Gudrun Glock and Katja Fiedler. I Photo: Achim Bachhausen
Gudrun Glock: What I admire about Katja is that she is calm and never freaks out. She does a lot with a lot of heart. She is patient. She is creative. Johanna will go her own way. She enjoys what she's doing now. She talks more and more and is proud of what she can do.
Katja Fiedler: What I particularly appreciate about my mum: She always let me go my own way, never interfered. Not even when I was running the small market myself. That's still the case today. She comes shopping as a good customer, she gives me valuable advice as a good customer. We've always exchanged a lot of ideas, even had differences of opinion. But in the end we always came to an agreement. What I like about my daughter is that she is so independent. She took me a bit by surprise with her decision to join REWE and organised a training market on her own...
Johanna Fiedler:...I didn't want to start as an apprentice here as the boss's daughter, I wanted to earn respect. I learnt a lot from my grandmother about self-confidence and being a woman. I was always told: your grandma is the boss. She always had something to say, she could express herself, she had a big presence. That moulded me. I had the same impression of my mum. I think it's great to have two strong women in front of me. What I find strong about my mum is how involved she is everywhere. The many committees and the market, she manages a lot and achieves so much.
Gudrun Glock: We can only encourage all women. You need support, in the family in any case, and every businesswoman should have a partner. But it should also be possible to go it alone. REWE could perhaps do more to encourage potential saleswomen to think in terms of self-employment. I would never have joined the supervisory board for myself, but others saw my potential.
REWEformer is the translation of the focus on social cooperation between retailers and management in the REWE Group, as agreed in the "Munich Declaration". The "Munich Declaration" laid the foundation for cooperation between retailers and management. The rules of cooperation were laid down in a binding manner by the committees representing all independent retailers within REWE Group. Changes to these rules can also only be made by these committees. Today, the
Today, retailers are actively involved in shaping the fortunes of REWE Group, whether in the SAS (Strategy Committee) circles, as topic experts or as management of retailers in the regions.
