"In deep sorrow": Desperate Karstadt employee cries in ARD Tagesschau

Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof will soon be closing dozens of its department stores in Germany.

In the ARD Tagesschau, an employee is overwhelmed by emotions.

Kassel/Essen - Both names are closely linked to the success stories of German department stores in the last century.

But those times are far behind.

In November 2019, Galeria Kaufhof GmbH and Karstadt Warenhaus GmbH merged to form Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof GmbH.

After a short time, however, in the middle of the corona pandemic, insolvency proceedings were applied for at the Essen district court on July 1, 2020 - the company's headquarters are in the city in the Ruhr area.

Closures at Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof GmbH: 52 of 129 department stores affected

The next bad news followed this Monday (March 13): The company announced that it would close another 52 of the 129 department stores it currently has in the current insolvency proceedings.

Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof GmbH is therefore planning further severe cuts in the branch network.

More than 4,000 employees are to be transferred to a transfer company, it said.

Today is undoubtedly a difficult day for all of us.

In the past few weeks we have fought intensively for each individual location.

Arndt Geiwitz, General Representative of Galeria

The remaining branches are to be extensively renovated over the next three years.

The creditors' meeting on March 27 in Essen still has to vote on the plans.

According to the information, the affected Galeria branches are closing in two waves.

31 locations as of June 30, 2023, including, for example, those branches in Hamburg-Harburg and in Hamburg-Wandsbek, on Leipzig's Neumarkt or the Galeria department store on Königstrasse in Nuremberg.

Or the one at Munich Central Station.

+

Soon the doors will be permanently closed: Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof will soon be closing dozens of branches.

© dpa

Closures at Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof: branches in Berlin, Frankfurt and Stuttgart including

By January 31, 2024, 21 locations are to follow, for example in Berlin-Charlottenburg, on Frankfurt's Zeil or in Stuttgart's Eberhard-Strasse.

The 77 department stores that will not be closed include the well-known branch on Munich's Marienplatz or the location in Kassel, as well as the Karstadt-Galeria department store branch in Göttingen.

The department store in Gelsenkirchen, on the other hand, is being closed – which an employee there is obviously taking with them.

“When it is then so concretely written in black and white, one is in deep mourning.

That's just the way it is," explained Anja Sabrowski from the Galeria Gelsenkirchen works council with tears on the ARD Tagesschau.

According to the report, the general works council spoke of a “pitty black day”.

Around 5,000 of the current 17,000 employees are threatened with termination.

Supposedly also in branches that are not to be closed.

+

Dismayed at the end of her Galeria branch: a Kaufhof employee from Gelsenkirchen.

© Screenshot ARD/Tagesschau

Closures at Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof GmbH: trade union ver.di criticizes

“It is undoubtedly a difficult day for all of us today.

In the past few weeks we have fought intensively for each individual location and have entered into tough internal and external discussions," explained Arndt Geiwitz, Galeria's chief representative, in a public statement.

The trade union ver.di, on the other hand, criticized the lack of an “alternative restructuring concept”.

And so, in many places in Germany, the department stores that once belonged as Galeria Kaufhof or Karstadt as a matter of course are disappearing from the image of inner cities.

List of rubrics: © Screenshot ARD/Tagesschau