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In 2019, North Rhine-Westphalia had an above-average number of start-ups in the statistics in the national comparison.
Only Berlin, Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein, Hesse and Bavaria were better off than NRW.
In Baden-Wuerttemberg, Lower Saxony and seven other federal states, however, according to the Bonn Institute for SME Research (IfM), there was a worse climate for business start-ups, takeovers and immigration of businesses and taking up part-time employment.
In 2020, the number of commercial start-ups fell due to the corona, according to the IfM nationwide in the first half of the year by 15.5 percent compared to 2019. Nevertheless, according to the Federal Statistics Office, there were around 24,400 small business start-ups in North Rhine-Westphalia by October of the previous year.
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In the first nine months of 2020, the state-owned NRW Bank alone more than doubled its funding for start-ups and existing companies to 4.8 billion euros compared to the same period in the previous year.
The following five examples show the challenges founders and young companies face.
The food deliverer
In front of an organic market in Meerbusch near Düsseldorf, Sascha Plewka stows a box of groceries in his trailer.
The 48-year-old rides the goods ordered the day before to the customer on his cross bike, making 20 to 25 trips a day, even in wind and weather.
"I plan the routes in advance so that I don't have too many rallies."
In June Plewka registered its shopping and delivery service as a business under the name “AngelBikes”.
"It is slowly starting to pay off," says the former data protection consultant who specialized in the travel industry.
But when his job broke away in spring due to the corona, the racing enthusiast dared to take the plunge into self-employment with a start-up grant from the employment agency.
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And with a fee of six euros or more, the service is affordable for customers, and certain services for seniors could also be billed through long-term care and health insurance, he says then supports me. "
The nut butter makers
Benjamin Porten, 29, and Lorenz Greiner, 24, have received a state start-up grant since December.
In Cologne, the two friends are preparing for the launch of their new product line.
Her online shop for organic nut butter, which consists of one hundred percent natural ingredients and is said to have unusual flavor combinations, started under the name “Naugthy Nuts” - in German roughly “cheeky nuts”.
“Basically, our aim is to reinvent peanut butter,” says Porten, who, like Greiner, studied business administration at the University of Cologne.
Their spreads are produced without palm oil and added sugar, and sweetened with dates or agave juice.
"All ingredients are also organically grown and certified accordingly."
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After starting on naughtynuts.de with initially five varieties, the two of them would also like to sell their nut butter through traditional grocery stores from spring.
"The samples have already been sent," says Porten.
Last summer, thanks to the Corona easing, the two business partners contacted 30 production sites across Europe and visited a dozen personally.
They finally found what they were looking for in Italy, where production is now based on their specifications.
And with the concept, they have meanwhile also succeeded in convincing two investors who, in addition to a financial investment, also bring valuable contacts to the food industry.
The mosaic publisher
The example of the mosaic artist Houran Almahrouk shows that most of the start-ups do not work without a certain amount of support.
The man from Syria, who has lived in Germany as a recognized refugee since 2014, started as a small business owner in summer 2020 with a loan from the NRW Bank in Wuppertal.
"A consultant from the IHK Wuppertal helped me a lot with the application," says the 27-year-old.
With the start-up loan, he was able to finance a delivery truck and tools; he is now active throughout North Rhine-Westphalia, laying mosaics in bathrooms, kitchens and living rooms.
For a while Almahrouk worked for the Dortmund mosaic artist Robert Kaller - and there he also passed on in courses how to lay mosaics the oriental way.
It is hardly known in Europe, he says.
His website mosaik-portal.de is due to go live soon.
“It was difficult here at the beginning,” says Almahrouk, who fled to Germany alone.
In the meantime he has settled in and speaks good German.
"And my business has also started well."
The rose dryers
Sarah Zergaw, 31, and Paolo Oliva, 34, founded their flower delivery company Emmie Gray in Düsseldorf without any subsidies, and sales really increased in the Corona year.
Especially in the current times with many contact restrictions, many people would send flower greetings and make themselves nice at home, says Zergaw, who studied business administration and American studies at the University of Duisburg-Essen.
It all started in a friend's cellar in Düsseldorf.
“We wanted to test the concept and try it out first, without going into debt straight away,” says Zergaw.
She was inspired by role models from South America for the idea of using a special process to make roses, and now other flowers, durable.
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The flowers of the treated roses by Emmie Gray, which are sent in special boxes, are as soft as tissue paper, but lose their scent during treatment.
"If you wish, it can be added with a spray," says Sarah Zergaw.
After the two founders had already started in 2016, they had also applied for the € 60,000 start-up award of the NRW Bank and the State Minister for Economic Affairs last year.
Even if it wasn't enough for one of the top three places, Emmie Gray ended up in the top ten of more than a hundred applicants.
On Mother's Day in May 2020, almost as many deliveries were sent to Italy as domestically, reports Paolo Oliva, who worked for a fashion label after studying economics.
A year ago, a so-called “Business Angel” was also taken on board as an investor in order to further roll out the mail-order flower business internationally.
In the meantime, the founders have reached their limits with 35 permanent employees and other seasonal workers on the 1500 square meters that they rented in Düsseldorf.
"Our business is developing dynamically."
The toupee makers
The start-up OC Hairsystems was only founded on June 1, 2020 in Düsseldorf's Medienhafen.
"We have revolutionized the concept of the toupee," says Alessandro Causarano confidently.
He is a teacher and one of the four founders, all of whom had previously worked as a hairdresser
had nothing to do.
But because the 30-year-old had problems with thinning hair, the four founders dealt with the subject of hair replacement - in cooperation with a university and a company in North Rhine-Westphalia, they developed a new adhesive technology.
“The solution is a firmly bonded hair system that is suitable for everyday use, with which even diving is no problem.” At the moment, a lot is going through video advice, and business with external customers is of course suffering from the current corona restrictions.
"Once that is over, we are also planning branches outside of Düsseldorf," says Causarano.
The quartet's concept was so convincing that the Kreissparkasse Düsseldorf approved a medium six-figure loan.
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This text is from WELT AM SONNTAG. We will be happy to deliver them to your home on a regular basis.
Source: WELT AM SONNTAG