Robert Friedmann, the long-time head of the Würth Group, is not inclined to exaggerate, but when he talks about the past 15 months he speaks of a rollercoaster of emotions: “From an apocalyptic mood we went into such a strong boom phase as none of us has seen it yet. ”This is by no means just looking back.

Although Würth has now closed the first half of the year with an increase in sales of more than 20 percent and with an almost doubled result, Friedmann is extremely tense.

“When I meet colleagues, the first thing I do is ask them whether there are any signs of falling demand,” reports the Würth boss and adds: “There is no indicator that worries us.

But common sense knows that it cannot go on like this.

We are prepared for anything. "

Susanne Preuss

Business correspondent in Stuttgart.

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    For the time being, the Würth team has quasi luxury problems.

    The sales of the world market leader for fastening and assembly technology rose in Germany by more than 16 percent, abroad by as much as 24 percent to a total of 8.4 billion euros.

    This enormous growth in almost all business areas exceeds expectations - and thus also the plans.

    "The organization is groaning," confirms Friedmann: The considerably larger quantities of goods have to be channeled through shops, warehouses and factories and of course also processed in the administration.

    From a good 79,000 employees at the turn of the year, the workforce grew to almost 81,800 in the first half of the year, but Würth is careful about increasing capacity.

    Business is heavily influenced by external factors more than usual.

    Above all, a lack of raw material deliveries poses major challenges for Würth, for example for fastening elements, wooden connectors, mounting rails and fittings.

    Overall, however, he is satisfied with his own ability to deliver, says Friedmann.

    The last crisis in 2008/2009 taught that it pays to maintain customer service for as long as possible.

    This was taken to heart in the first lockdown last year and with the rapid turnaround in demand, an advantage over the competition was achieved.

    Hamster behavior during construction

    But because Würth customers are still not quite so sure about the ability to deliver, many of them are currently ordering more, reports Friedmann, referring to the toilet paper effect that consumers experienced last spring: after the first customers were hoarded had, the fear of coming off badly increased even more. Now you can see that Würth customers changed their otherwise short-term ordering behavior and, for example, ordered all the necessary parts for a construction project in one fell swoop or even more.

    It is quite possible, says Friedmann, that this inventory effect resulted in an 8 to 10 percent increase in sales, i.e. half of the total increase: “We cannot estimate that well, and you don't know how long it will last.” He speaks of imbalances: at some point will be the customers reduce their stocks again and this turnover is then missing.

    Delivery bottlenecks of a completely different kind could also have a negative impact on Würth's business, such as the lack of chips, which repeatedly restricts car production in Germany: where cars are not built due to missing chips, no other Würth parts are necessary.

    In some cases skyrocketing price increases of up to 20 percent

    Many of the imponderables are related to the sudden economic upswing after the Corona dip last year, but some connections are also surprising. A normal household cable, for example, is becoming more expensive because the pandemic largely brought flying to a standstill and thus the demand for kerosene plummeted. A by-product of the production of aviation fuel is a plasticizer that is used for the cable sheathing - and which is now scarce. Where demand is high, prices rise, which Friedmann continues to worry about. Sometimes you are confronted with daily prices, sometimes there are sudden increases of up to 20 percent. "You can't confront customers with new prices every few weeks," sighs Friedmann.

    How successful the passing on of the price increases will, however, have a major impact on whether the foundation group based in Künzelsau will manage to break another striking mark this year. After an operating result of 520 million euros had been achieved in the first half of the year (after 280 million euros in the previous year), an operating result of one billion euros would even be conceivable for the whole of 2021. As far as business volume is concerned, despite all the imponderables, Würth is planning double-digit sales growth to 16 billion euros.