German Chancellor Olaf Scholz delivers gala address
From a hardware wholesaler with two employees to a global market leader with more than 88,000 employees: This impressive development is the life’s work of Professor Reinhold Würth, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Würth Group. On 1 October 2024, he celebrated his 75th work anniversary. Family and friends, numerous guests from the worlds of politics, business and the arts as well as the company management congratulated Professor Reinhold Würth during a ceremony at Carmen Würth Forum in the German town of Künzelsau.
Robert Friedmann, Chairman of the Central Management Board of the Würth Group, and Norbert Heckmann, Chairman of the Management of Adolf Würth GmbH & Co. KG, welcomed the guests, and Reinhold Würth’s three grandchildren, Benjamin Würth, Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Würth Group, Sebastian Würth, Member of the Advisory Board of the Würth Group and Maria Würth, Deputy Executive Vice President of the Würth Group for Arts and Culture, gave a brief insight into the time they spent together.
“I stand before you, immensely grateful, and in all modesty and humility, knowing that I would never have achieved the success we are seeing today without the hard work and the loyalty of these 88,000 people from all these different cultures, different backgrounds, with different nationalities, and different religions,“ said Professor Würth.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz also offered his congratulations on this special occasion in Künzelsau: “It is thanks to entrepreneurs like Reinhold Würth that Germany has such a strong economy. His entrepreneurial courage and his tireless commitment to the company and its employees are impressive and deserve my respect and admiration. The company’s success is exemplary of one of the most important pillars of Germany as a business location: More than three million family businesses create and maintain more than half of the jobs subject to social insurance,” the Chancellor said in his speech.
Some of Professor Würth’s favorite pieces of music — performed by the Gaechinger Cantorey of the Internationale Bachakademie Stuttgart and the Würth Philharmoniker orchestra — accompanied the ceremony. The evening opened with “Finlandia”, a tone poem by Jean Sibelius. Later performances included the “Huntsmen’s Chorus” from the opera “Der Freischütz” by German composer Carl Maria von Weber and the “Priests’ Chorus” from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s “The Magic Flute” opera. The program was rounded off with the “Singschule” from Albert Lortzing’s “Zar und Zimmermann” opera.
About the Würth Group
The Würth Group is the global market leader in the development, production and sale of assembly and fastening materials. Other trading and production companies, known as the Allied Companies, operate in related business areas, ranging from electrical wholesale and electronics to financial services. The Group currently employs more than 88,000 employees in over 400 companies with more than 2,700 shops across 80 countries. The Group achieved sales of EUR 20.4 billion in the 2023 fiscal year. With over 8,000 employees, Adolf Würth GmbH & Co. KG in Künzelsau is the largest single company in the Würth Group.
