Kempten, September 13, 2018. As of the first of September, logistics provider Dachser has more employees than at any other point in its history: some 30,500 people around the world are employed by the family company based in Kempten in Allgäu, Germany; that same country is home to 16,246 of those employees. In addition, this year 732 young people have chosen to train or study with Dachser in Germany—the largest number ever.
As the economy continues to boom, its effects are being felt on the labour market, too: logistics provider Dachser currently has its largest workforce since the company was founded. It employed 29,098 people at the end of 2017; now, just six months later, that figure has risen by some 5 percent. “People are and will continue to be our most important resource,” says CEO Bernhard Simon. “After all, it is our employees who pave the way toward a connected, globalized economy, who organize storage and delivery processes that span the globe, and who are the face to our customers.”
The family company is again earning top marks for its training program as well. A total of 732 young people from all across Germany have decided to start their careers with Dachser—5 percent more than in the previous year. In total, Dachser trains 1,757 apprentices and students nationwide; outside Germany, 41 prospective logistics specialists are currently undergoing a training programme to become “Dachser forwarding and logistics specialists”. The most popular options for trainees are freight forwarding and logistics agent, warehouse clerk, and professional truck driver. Development in the number of people that the company is training as professional drivers with the help of Dachser Service und Ausbildungs GmbH is especially gratifying: in summer 2018, 23 drivers successfully finished the program, and another 106 people in Germany started that same program. Dachser now plans to expand its successful training concept to Austria. In fact, eleven people have started training as professional truck drivers at Dachser Austria—an increase from last year, when only three people throughout the whole country signed up for the training.
“As Germany’s third-largest industry, logistics offers a broad range of challenging careers that promise a bright future,” says Vera Weidemann, Head of Corporate Human Resources at Dachser. “In our industry, qualified staff is the limiting factor for growth. That’s why we need well-trained and motivated employees, now more than ever.” Demanding yet effective training is part of the corporate culture at family-owned Dachser: its training rate is about 10 percent. And in the spirit of corporate responsibility, the company hires trainees who successfully complete their programme.