Eco test

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ÖKO-TEST AG
Öko-Test-Logo.svg
description Consumer magazine
publishing company ÖKO-TEST AG (Germany)
Headquarters Frankfurt
First edition 1985
Frequency of publication per month
Sold edition 103,397 copies
( IVW 2/2020)
Widespread edition 103,809 copies
( IVW 2/2020)
Range 1.20 million readers
( MA 2020 I )
Editor-in-chief Hans Oppermann
executive Director Hans Oppermann
Web link oekotest.de
ISSN 0948-2644

Öko-Test is a German-language consumer magazine that the media holding the SPD part (about 68%). It has been published monthly by the publisher of the same name since April 1985. Until 1992 the magazine was called “Öko-Test-Magazin”. In addition, “Öko-Test Ratgeber” and “Öko-Test Spezial” as well as “Öko-Test Yearbooks” appear several times a year. "Öko-Test Kompakt" and "Öko-Test Kompass" were also published by 2012.

The sold circulation of the magazine is 103,397 according to IVW 2/2020. The reach is given as 1.71 million readers per month (MA 2014). Öko-Test maintains a website on which test results can be viewed for a fee or (since 2019) partially free of charge.

Companies

Öko-Test AG is based in Frankfurt am Main , the board and editor-in-chief is Hans Oppermann. The publishing house has around 50 employees. The turnover in 2007 was around 11 million euros.

Öko-Test AG in Frankfurt is 100% shareholder of the publishing house. The former editor-in-chief, managing director and board member Jürgen Stellpflug holds over 5% of the shares in the AG. Around 66.2% of the holding shares are owned by GLG Green Lifestyle GmbH in Hamburg , which in turn is 100% owned by Deutsche Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft (ddvg), the division of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). The SPD unites its media holdings under the ddvg. The remaining approx. 33.8% of Öko-Test AG belong to Stellpflug and around 800 other shareholders .

Öko-Test AG is responsible for print products such as Öko-Test , the Öko-Test yearbooks and the Öko-Test guide. The Augsburg branch, previously responsible for u. a. Online, sales and press relations were closed in May 2018. All online activities now take place at Utopia AG in Munich, also a wholly-owned subsidiary of GLG Green Lifestyle GmbH.

As a consumer service, Öko-Test employees have set up the Verein Ökologische Konsumentberatung e. V. founded. The non-profit association has made it its business to answer consumer inquiries.

history

From Curiosity magazine to ÖKO-TEST magazine

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.

The forerunner of the Öko-Test-Magazin was the Neugier - Illustrierte Zeitschrift mit Öko-Test , which was published in April / May 1983 by the Neugier-Verlag GmbH (Berlin) of the same name. The founder and publisher was the business journalist Jürgen Rauscher , the financier was the chemist Peter Plieninger, who was born in Heidelberg in 1947. His father, Hans Plieninger , was also one of the early limited partners of the later ÖKO-TEST-Verlag GmbH & Co KG. Peter Plieninger later transferred his shares in Neugier-Verlag GmbH to the association "Friends of ÖKO-Test-Magazins eV", which became the majority shareholder of ÖKO-TEST-Verlag GmbH without having to raise capital of its own.

The journal Neugier , for which only one issue is recorded in the journal catalog of the German National Library, has not met with much journalistic response, even if the test published in it took up a hot potato : cadmium in Lego building blocks, i.e. in children's toys. Rather, the significance of the test was that it was used to lay the basic concept for the ÖKO-TEST magazine, which was yet to be developed.

Journalistic and political lines of tradition

The concept of the ÖKO-TESTS (see below) was the foundation on which the new magazine should build. This foundation was embedded in journalistic traditions that could only develop again in this way against the background of the political conditions in the early 1980s.

In the participation prospectus, the arch spans from the investigative American journalists of the early 20th century, the Muckrakers , to the Federal Republican DM of the 1960s and the media with an educational character such as concrete , päd.extra or the Berliner Extra-Dienst , which consciously understood as a counter- public.

Jürgen Rauschel, who worked as an editor at DM from 1963 to 1965 , continued to feel obliged to its tradition. Therefore, the detailed excursus on this "first magazine with product tests" in the participation project is not surprising, where its success is mainly attested because it dealt with "the most everyday things in the world: with bread, furniture, pants, detergents, cars, Apartments. Because it related prices and use values ​​to one another. Because she compared prices and exposed advertising claims. And then the paint on the economic miracle fell off. That was the political thing about the DM . ”From this, the ÖKO-TEST magazine claims:

“The ÖKO-TEST magazine wants to investigate the usefulness of the things around us in a very similar way; But not only goods, but also areas of life and living conditions, depending on the circumstances. Research criteria are no longer price, practical shape, ease of care, taste, but health, social responsibility, responsibility for the ecosystem in which we live. When it becomes more and more difficult to breathe the air that surrounds us, then it really doesn't matter whether the glove compartment on any test car is large or small. "

It remains to be seen whether this lofty claim could ever be met in all its complexity by the ÖKO-TEST magazine. But the fact is that it could only be formulated in this way under specific social conditions. And only in a specific social situation could he develop the power of persuasion that actually had practical consequences. Rauschel sums it up in 1994 as follows:

“The development of the ÖKO-TEST magazine was only possible in a certain political situation in the 1980s. The early 80s were the heyday of the eco-movement in West Germany. Peace movement, anti-nuclear power campaigns, women's lib, all kinds of citizens' initiatives were interlinked and together produced a green and colorful fundamental criticism of the prevailing Western European lifestyle. [..] The core of the movement drew a partly open, partly secretly sympathetic environment, which soon became many times larger than the core of the movement itself: The political party of alternatives, the Greens, received around two million votes in elections. "

At a time when everything seemed possible, even for a penniless journalist it was not a utopia to found a magazine, because: “The eco-movement now needs a general-interest magazine.” That was what the first poster with the idea said the magazine was launched and the fundraising campaign was launched.

The journalistic concept

With the recourse to the old DM , the journalistic guiding principle for the ÖKO-TEST magazine was in principle given, which led to the claim to make a “magazine for the practical everyday life of people”, “looking for ways to increasingly poison us to counteract immediate living conditions ". This claim should not be redeemed by mere reporting on environmental scandals, but by hard facts. Delivering these was the task of the ÖKO tests. You should analyze the ingredients of food on a scientific basis as well as their production conditions or problems of waste disposal. And they should be more than just comparative product tests: health and ecological aspects had priority over purely functional ones, their results should enable us to change traditional everyday behavior, companies and authorities should be urged to eliminate grievances. Political impact was intended, but party-political neutrality was a journalistic imperative.

“The comparative product test can add an environmental variant to its test criteria, i.e. also measure the noise with which lawnmowers get on the nerves of their surroundings. But that's all. The eco-test would have to ask about the point of mowing the lawn and examine whether it would not make more sense to let meadows grow. "

True to the claim that the tests open up alternative courses of action for the readership and strengthen their ability to act, each test should end with a summary titled “What to do?” That offered options without imposing any directives on action. The tests in the booklet should also correspond to the “aftermath” section, in which it was possible to show what happened after the tests (or other reporting). This of course also had a symbolic character for its own readership, who could be conveyed in such a way that eco-tests had an effect, were actually the “antidote to toxic everyday life”, as it could be read on the poster already quoted above.

The laboratories and institutes with which we had to cooperate played an important role in the tests and the further development of the test methods. An own test laboratory was illusory for reasons of cost, but there were alternatives. In the course of the anti-nuclear power movement and the environmental movement as a whole, small independent research institutions were initially set up. The initiators were often academic staff at universities who pursued the goal of enabling independent research work on environmentally relevant topics, above all independent of industry. In keeping with the times and the self-image, it was usually self-managed and self-determined research institutes that were open to the concept of ECO tests and guaranteed scientific reliability. Most of these research institutions were from 1986 members of the Working Group of Ecological Research Institutes (AGÖF) eV

The eco-tests as a central concept module also formed the center of the magazine structure, which was based on a more conventional three-part division:

“First the editorial, the letters to the editor, the short eco-social reports, followed by the hard and long contributions. In the middle came the eco-tests . The third part was covered by friendly and useful magazine topics, recipes, advice, book reviews, the calendar, the advertisements, etc. The diary was on the last page. The readers of the Öko-Test magazine could also start reading from the back. "

Christof Gassner's design concept then ensured the unconventional mixing and breaking up of the magazine structure .

The design concept

Between April 2013 and September 2015 was Museum Applied Arts (Frankfurt am Main) , the "Less show, but better. Design in Frankfurt 1925 to 1985: The Frankfurter Zimmer ”on display. This was followed in March 2016 by the exhibition “Alles neu! 100 Years of New Typography and New Graphics in Frankfurt am Main ”. What both exhibitions have in common is that they also present Christof Gassner's works as examples for the respective context. His design concept for the ÖKO-TEST magazine can be found there alongside the design icons from the “BRAUN Design Collection” created by Dieter Rams . But the ÖKO-TEST magazine, which is recognized in both exhibitions as exemplary for dealing with typography and graphics, is, apart from the logo, no longer the magazine that is available in kiosks today, but the one for which Christof Gassner was responsible for the design in the mid-1980s.

Between magazine concepts that were “blended with smooth consumer aesthetics for the new German Yuppian temper” and “often self-knitted and self-crocheted, always as dear as dull and gray, always well-intentioned and therefore naturally rare good “publication strategies of the eco-movement,“ between lifestyle and muesli design ”, Gassner tried from 1984 to find a new project language for the ÖKO-TEST magazine. According to his understanding, design was not a mere illustration of the content, but part of the content, also autonomous from the editorial staff. What was wanted was a new form of visual communication, a visual language of its own that had to assert itself and prove itself in the mass media market. The cornerstones of this new visual language were:

  • The elementary building blocks: color, characters, typography.
  • The imagery: illustration, photography.
  • The interaction of text and image in the structure of the magazine.

colour

The original color spectrum of the ÖKO-TEST magazine

One difficulty was that it seemed necessary for an environmentally oriented magazine to be printed on recycled paper. Such paper was gray in the 1980s and only available to a limited extent for the requirements of web offset printing. At that time, only the Steinbeis company was able to produce acceptable paper. This starting material became a determining factor in the design concept, as it ruled out the use of color photographs optimized for high gloss. It required a separate color concept with the colors red, yellow and blue, which Christoph Gassner described as follows: It was "to be found in the folk art of various cultures, in embroidery, costumes and ceramics", "a color contrast that shaped early medieval book illumination and in many ways occurs in the art and design of our century. The contrast of the pure color. "

character

If the eco-tests were to be the unique selling proposition of the new magazine, then a logo was needed that clearly conveyed this claim.

The ÖKO-Test logo on the investment prospectus

According to Gassner, it is not so much the font, the extra bold, slim Futura that does this, but the sheet between the words eco and test. But it is not a symbolic sheet, but the sheet that changes from issue to issue that matters. The constantly new leaf in the logo signals "on the one hand the richness and biodiversity of nature, on the other hand the process of constant change":

“This process of change takes place on different time and space levels. First, from month to month, in the head of the magazine. Then, from page to page with alternating little sheets of paper as 'running footnotes' in each issue. Sometimes it is made into the cover picture or the lead story. After all, it shapes the appearance of the publisher: Each employee got their own sheet on their business card. "

typography

A no-frills language, as it should be the style for the ÖKO tests, required a typographical translation that puts the utility value in the foreground. According to Gassner, the typeface of the texts should "convey something of the everyday use character of a typewriter type", but since this took up too much space, the Rockwell came into play, "a typeface with strong corners and edges, a typeface less to dream than to act" .

The Rockwell font family

The sans serif Futura , preferably in

The Futura font family

bold and narrow cuts:

“ We didn't need anything more than Rockwell and Furura . We were interested in what is possible and feasible with this limited typographic vocabulary, how typographic resources can be optimally used. As an introduction to the test part, we varied the four letters TEST every month . After five years there were 60 variations on a theme. In other words: we tested typographically. Syntax and semantics of a term. "

Illustration and photography

For Gassner, design elements available from picture agencies were not an issue, neither for direct use nor as raw material for his own designs. His raw materials were everyday things, everything that was discussed in the magazine's tests and reports. The task was to put them in new contexts in terms of design in order to “use them to form new symbols, hieroglyphs of the 20th century”, and consciously to tie in with earlier techniques: “Our tools were in the tradition of photo assemblers from the 20s , Glue and scissors. And a (used) repro camera. ”Gassner does not conceal the fact that in this search for new images the line to the surreal was sometimes touched or crossed: one could see fish swimming around between dishes to be washed, ants dismantling a car , or a flowering tree growing out of a broomstick.

An exception to the primacy of do-it-yourself concerns the penultimate page of the magazine. Just as Jürgen Rauschel defended the diary on the last page, which he claims to have punched into the paper against the opposition of the entire editorial team and the graphics, as an instrument of reader-paper bonding, Gassner insisted on a non-verbal guest commentary the penultimate page. It came mostly from a prominent source: drawings by Borislav Šajtinac, for example, who seems to be better known as a filmmaker in Germany, although he is also an excellent draftsman, collages by Isolde Monson-Baumgart , graphics by poster artist Jan Lenica .

Non-verbal comments on the test topics were also the photographs by Gabriele Lorenzer that introduced the tests. "From the very beginning, she developed the magazine's independent photographic imagery, in which she interpreted and staged the test topics." Lorenzer, for whom photographs did not need to be supplemented by words, wanted to bring together experiences of reality and fantasy with her pictures, but not through naturalistic depiction reality, but rather through its staging.

The photographs taken between 1985 and 1991 for ÖKO-TEST magazine were republished in 2000 under the title People, Animals, Fantasies . In the review of this book, Monika Osberghaus writes about her:

“They stage the object in a new environment or reduce it to its original function, show it in a paradox or decorate it exaggeratedly lavishly. This creates a pair from thing and image, and the tension between the two always points to the strange in everyday life. Involuntarily, you remember these couples and try to uncover similar connections elsewhere. [..] Often the test object itself is not in the picture. [..] The motifs often take a step back in time, they were there before the products that were tested and fulfill their task in a simpler way. [..] Gabriele Lorenzer sees the dramas in the inconspicuous and looks for a production that can best tell the story of such a drama. Or she stops the viewer's gaze with her still lifes reminiscent of old masters. They are grainy, high-contrast images on which lilacs shimmer like porcelain and fruits look like hand-blown glass, rough-soft and translucent, a temptation to touch. "

The interaction of text and image in the structure of the magazine

Gassner refers to the very different ideas about the relationship between text and image in the magazine. Readers, publishers and editors each had their own ideas, set priorities based on their respective interests: primacy of the text, images as reinforcement of the text, space for advertisements instead of lavish illustrations. For Gassner, however, the illustrations were “stumbling blocks” with their own message. He wanted the discourse between text and image, in which images are not explained away and texts are not illustrated away. His credo: “Do not ruminate with words what can be seen anyway, do not trace literally with pictures what is described in words next door.” If the ÖKO-TEST magazine wanted to question traditional consumption habits, so would Gassner have to encroach on the consumption of texts and images.

At the same time, Gassner tries to give his creative and didactic approach a more relaxing touch. He sees the departure from traditional magazine design norms as a concept to counteract the problems inherent in environmental magazines. For him, design was a "tightrope walk between the apocalypse and the perfect world, between the daily catastrophe pictures [..] and the colorful shine of the fun of the brave new world."

New design (since October 2019)

With the October 2019 issue of Öko-Test, the design concept of the magazine was revised.

Financing and ownership in the founding phase

As already described above, the story began with the Neugier-Verlag GmbH, which Jürgen Rauscher had founded with the financial support of Peter Plieninger. After the further development of the concept towards the ÖKO-TEST magazine, the renaming of the Neugier-Verlag GmbH to the ÖKO-TEST Verlag GmbH and Rauschel's move from Berlin to Frankfurt, a financing concept had to be developed parallel to the journalistic concept, because with that existing GmbH capital alone would not have been possible.

In 1983, together with a tax consultancy company based in Frankfurt, a minimum starting capital of DM 600,000 was determined. To collect this, another legal form had to be found. The choice fell on the GmbH & Co. KG , a form of company that was already disreputable as a depreciation company . However, the legal construct behind this negative image turned out to be extremely beneficial for the new company. The determining factor, general partner , in this legal form was the GmbH, which did not have to be opened to external investors. Rather, they should be won over as limited partners , which would not give them any direct participation in publishing policy, but only a manageable liability risk and - as long as the company was not yet making a profit - the possibility of tax savings. The result was the ÖKO-TEST Verlag GmbH & Co. KG Betriebsgesellschaft , probably the first alternative depreciation company.

The first investment prospectus from 1983 summarized all these journalistic and corporate law issues and from then on served the acquisition of shares. After a sluggish start - with a minimum deposit of 500.00 DM, only 80,000 DM came together in 1983, which grew to 250,000 DM by the summer of 1984 - the success of the campaign became apparent in the autumn of 1984, so that Jürgen Rauschel in November 1984 was able to rent editorial rooms and hire editorial and publishing staff. The sales start for the ÖKO-TEST magazine should take place with the April 1985 issue.

If it was already said above that the GmbH has the say in this legal form, then the question arises as to who owned ÖKO-TEST Verlag GmbH and who could exercise influence over it. During the founding and early days, the sole managing director was Jürgen Rüsselel, who saw himself as the trustee of the capital contributed by Peter Plieninger (80,000 DM) and who for a long time reserved the right to veto all decisions. After Plieninger wanted to overwrite his capital share, only one addressee came into question: the association "Friends of ÖKO-Test-Magazin eV", which has now been founded. Rauschel describes what follows from this as follows:

“All employees had to join the association. Those who left also had to leave the club. This ensured that the workforce in the company formally played the main role. According to the paper, we were a so-called alternative company. "

The terms “formal” and “so-called” in this quote address the gap between the claim (which is also effective for advertising) and reality. Rauschel, who always writes very clearly from a self-centered perspective in his article, himself points out that the original general equality cannot be maintained and he was forced to appoint himself editor-in-chief for the first nine issues. He blames a competence gap for this, although without showing who noticed this, but admits:

“There were factions formed, later also power struggles under sometimes bizarre conditions. […] There were times when it was a pleasure to work in this company. There were times when everyone was just scared of each other. The internal structure of the project was never fully developed, actually quite immature at all times. It hardly differed from other alternative projects of the 80s. But that's not an excuse. "

Thirteen years after Jürgen Rauschel, in 2007, Hannes Koch, the aforementioned Jürgen Stellpflug, meanwhile “at the same time editor-in-chief, board member of the stock corporation and shareholder”, has forged “from the alternative a conventional company structure” in which it is in the internal relationship with the employees "Not always friendly" approach. Stellpflug as the "undisputed boss of the company" is "a power man, a hard bone". But Koch's conclusion is: “This property may have contributed to the magazine's existence at all.” However, the price for this was high. Today we can no longer speak of a general-interest magazine that the eco-movement needs (according to the slogan already quoted on the first advertising poster) in a double sense: Neither is the ÖKO-TEST magazine the magazine of any movement (if it is , except in the outward self-image that ever was), there is still an eco-movement in the form that was indispensable as a founding requirement for the magazine. And the idea that the company should belong to those who work in it (that was the original idea behind the association “Friends of ÖKO-Test-Magazin eV”) is long gone. There was no more talk of this association and the employees organized in it in 2007 when Hannes Koch stated: “50 percent and 20 shares, i.e. the majority, belong to the SPD media holding DDVG . Editor-in-chief Jürgen Stellpflug holds nine percent. 41 percent of the shares are in the free float of around 1,500 shareholders. ”A“ Announcement pursuant to Section 20 (6) AktG ”of November 6, 2015 states the current ownership structure:

“GLG Green Lifestyle GmbH, Hamburg, has informed us that it directly owns more than a fourth of the shares in our company. She also informed us that she owns a majority stake in our company. Deutsche Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft mbh, Hamburg, has informed us that it no longer directly owns any shares in our company and also no longer holds a majority stake in our company. She also informed us that she indirectly owns more than a fourth part of the shares in our company and a majority stake in our company, as she owns the participation of the dependent GLG Green Lifestyle GmbH in our company in accordance with Section 16 (4) AktG is attributable. Frankfurt am Main, November 2015 "

According to the balance sheet of ÖKO-Test Holding AG for 2013, its subscribed capital was EUR 5,112,900.00. For 2014, the Management Board proposed in the agenda for the Annual General Meeting on November 6, 2015 that the net profit of EUR 749,001.12 should be used to pay a dividend of EUR 0.10 per share.

The still existing ÖKO-TEST Verlag GmbH, whose equity amounts to 2,242,000.00 euros, concluded a control and profit and loss transfer agreement with ÖKO-Test Holding AG with the approval of the shareholders' meeting on November 8, 2010.

After internal disagreements between the shareholders GLG Green Lifestyle GmbH and Jürgen Stellpflug, the latter was relieved of his positions as managing director and editor-in-chief at the beginning of April 2018. The previous editor-in-chief Mirko Kaiser has been appointed as the new editor-in-chief. Hans Oppermann has been appointed as the new chairman of the management and board member of the publishing house.

The founders of ÖKO-TEST

Jürgen Rauschel was instrumental in founding Öko-Test.

He died on May 3, 2005. In an obituary by Gregor Eisenhauer it says about the last center of his life: "These last years he lived in a ground floor apartment in Prenzlauer Berg, walled in by books and materials, spartan, completely focused on work." Twenty years earlier it was in his small apartment in downtown Frankfurt is hardly any different. It was office, creative and sales center in one, the bike hovered on the bookshelf above the bed. Preparing the founding of the magazine and the publishing house was his purpose in life, he had no doubts as to whether this could succeed (or did not show them). He was a man catcher, always trying to inspire others with his idea and to win them over to participate or work. In autumn 1984 he had achieved his first goal, the DM 600,000.00 necessary for the start had been subscribed as equity capital.

He mainly received practical support in this preparatory phase

  • Monika Gerigk, who worked at the publishing house after the official start and took special care of limited partner support. She later went to Burda Verlag and now works as a Russian teacher at the Freudenstadt Free Waldorf School.
  • Friedrich Siekmeier. He was later the first volunteer for the ÖKO-TEST magazine.

A circle grouped around these three people, more or less closely involved in the preparations, included:

  • Christof Gassner
  • Stephan Rotthaus, who today runs a consulting company for strategic marketing in the health market
  • Eckart Krüger, who today positions himself as a certified sales trainer, business coach and expert in neuromarketing and advertises on his company's website as "7 years responsible for advertising sales in ÖKO-TEST magazine (sales increased)" to be. This is not true, however, because the publishing house had already started to set up its own advertising department in 1988 and to hire its own employees.
  • Rolf Hermann from HTS Hagenovia Treuhand GmbH Steuerberatungsgesellschaft
  • Jürgen Maass
  • Ronald Steinmeyer, the co-founder of the health food magazine "Schrot & Korn"
  • Engelbert Schramm
  • Bernd Wältz, who, like Monika Gerigk, later worked in the publishing house and was also managing director of the publishing house for several years in the 1990s. Today he lives as a pensioner near Frankfurt.

This group was occasionally expanded to include limited partners, many of whom later remained closely associated with the magazine.

From January 1985 the first editorial team worked in the newly renovated rooms in Frankfurt-Sachsenhausen:

Worked in the publishing house:

  • Monika Gerigk
  • Bernd Wältz
  • Michael Hadamczik

Christof Gassner, who continued to work free of charge for the magazine, was supported by Monika Weiß in the graphics.

The starting salary of all employees was the same: 2,500.00 DM. An initial increase to 2,800.00 DM was not possible until 1988, and those who had to look after children (which was only the case in individual cases) received an allowance of 250.00 DM per Child. That was anything but lavish for the time, which is why it was occasionally joked that one had to be able to afford to work at ÖKO-TEST. But in view of the company's economic situation, there was no room for maneuver: Between 1983 and 1985 a loss of almost 1.5 million DM was made, in 1986 it was just under 930,000.00 DM, in 1987 176,000.00 DM and in 1988 again 249,000.00 DM. These losses had to be compensated again and again by newly acquired limited partnership capital. The fact that this was successful is not unjustifiably attributed to the self-advertisements published monthly in the magazine, which were intended to encourage people to request the participation documents by means of an attached reply card: “The response was overwhelming. In the years up to 1988 that I saw, we never needed a penny in bank loans. ”He would have better written“ got ”, because the reputation of being something“ alternative ”had already resulted in the original house bank suggested to the publisher to change banks. At the same time, the fact remains that in the years that followed, the company managed entirely without outside capital. It was the solidarity community of the eco and peace movement that ensured its survival. The story of how this legacy got into the hands of an SPD-owned holding has yet to be written.

Test work today

Öko-Test has tested over 100,000 products and services in 3,000 tests in 25 years. All end consumer products and services, such as B. pacifiers, mineral water, yogurt, shampoos, energy-saving lamps, medication, pension insurance and condoms were tested.

Test buyers from Öko-Test buy the products anonymously in stores. The company does not run its own laboratories itself, but works with testing institutes throughout Germany.

Öko-Test determines which pollutants, ingredients or efficacies the laboratories are looking for. The test criteria are being tightened more and more. In 2005, for example, the search for harmful trans fatty acids was carried out in nut nougat cream . After the manufacturers got this problem under control, however, the pollutant 3-MCPD fatty acid ester was discovered. As a result, in 2009 Öko-Test had the nut-nougat creams examined for this pollutant.

The test results of the laboratories are evaluated by the editors. Manufacturers often criticize that Öko-Test is far stricter than the legislator. Products that comply with legal requirements can also score poorly. Öko-Test, on the other hand, maintains that the legal limit values ​​would be included in the assessment considerations, but if there were alternatives to ingredients that are harmful to health, these would be the better choice. For example, aromatic amines as dyes on clothing are only prohibited by law from a content of 30 milligrams, but small amounts are also carcinogenic. The same applies to genetic engineering: foods that contain less than 0.9 percent genetically modified components are considered GM-free according to EU legislation. Öko-Test even devalues ​​products if they contain only the smallest amounts of genetically modified material. According to Öko-Test, there are also often loopholes in legal requirements. For example, the carcinogenic aromatic amines in textiles had been banned, but they were still allowed in baby and children's toys.

Since December 2010, Öko-Test has also taken so-called Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) into account on a case-by-case basis in the test reports , i.e. the question of the extent to which a company does justice to its social responsibility and the aspect of sustainability in production. On the one hand, it examines the extent to which companies feel committed to their responsibility in this regard, and on the other hand, what effort they put into this. The first test in this context dealt with children's toys, with the subject of child labor being addressed as an example. There is no assessment as part of the test; the queries are prepared in such a way that the readers should form their own opinion. By including CSR in the test reports, consumers have the opportunity to consider aspects such as labor, social or environmental standards in their purchase decisions. Companies are given incentives to deal with the topic themselves.

criticism

In the November 2003 issue, the magazine published a test that tested paternity tests by DNA testing laboratories. The laboratory journal reported in the April issue of the following year about inconsistencies in the comparison of tests, including a special selection of the test laboratories, mathematical errors of the article the author and the work of the article author (line a test lab, which itself parentage offers) itself. Laborjournal suggested influence by a lobby association and a partisan assessment by the author.

China expansion and wrong circulation figures for special issues

The SPD media holding Deutsche Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft launched the first independent consumer portal okoer.com in China in 2015. The German Öko-Test-Magazin should contribute its experience with ecological product tests and test the Chinese products in Germany. The hopes could not be fulfilled, Öko-Test is said to have lost millions. In the meantime, the Frankfurt public prosecutor's office is investigating suspicion of breach of trust in this matter.

At the same time, an internal audit report by a lawyer became known. According to this, Öko-Test is said to have given incorrect circulation numbers of its special issues for years in order to be able to demand higher prices from advertising customers.

Edition

Development of the number of copies sold

Development of the number of subscribers

literature

  • Öko-Test - live really well. Öko-Test-Magazin. Frankfurt M 1985ff. ISSN  0948-2644
  • Christof Gassner (Ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , Verlag Hermann Schmidt, Mainz, 1994, ISBN 3-87439-308-9 . The book gives a very detailed insight into the history of the ÖKO-TEST magazine, but it is strongly influenced by subjective interpretations of the project history, especially in the article by Jürgen Rüsselel.
  • Gabriele Lorenzer: People, Animals, Fantasies , Umschau Braus Verlag, Heidelberg, 2000, ISBN 9783829568258
  • Hannes Koch: Social Capitalists. Role models for a just economy. Rotbuch Verlag, Berlin, 2007, ISBN 978-3-86789-016-8
  • ÖKO-TEST-Verlag GmbH & Co KG: participation prospectus , Frankfurt, reprinted several times, here: 1989 edition
  • Klaus Klemp, Matthias Wagner K (ed.): Design in Frankfurt: 1920 - 1990 , exhibition catalog Museum Angewandte Kunst on the occasion of the exhibition “Das Frankfurter Zimmer” with an essay by Dieter Rams, avedition, Stuttgart, 2014, ISBN 978-3-89986 -207-2 . This publication is completely set in Futura.
  • Klaus Klemp, Matthias Wagner K (Ed.): Everything new! : 100 years of new typography and new graphics in Frankfurt am Main , exhibition catalog Museum Angewandte Kunst, avedition, Stuttgart, 2016, ISBN 3-89986-246-5

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Deutsche Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft mbH: Our holdings. In: www.ddvg.de. Retrieved November 10, 2016 .
  2. ↑ Patrick Junker: ÖKO-TEST press. In: oekotest.de. 2010, accessed September 7, 2016 .
  3. ↑ Patrick Junker: ÖKO-TEST Online. In: www.oekotest.de. Retrieved September 7, 2016 .
  4. ^ Patrick Junker: ÖKO-TEST Media. In: media.oekotest.de. 2014, accessed September 7, 2016 .
  5. ↑ Ökotest checks toothpastes for ingredients. Retrieved June 18, 2019 .
  6. ↑ a b c Imprint Öko-Test accessed on June 4, 2018
  7. ^ Meedia: New structure. Retrieved June 18, 2019 .
  8. ^ Deutsche Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft mbH: Home. In: www.ddvg.de. Retrieved November 10, 2016 .
  9. ↑ Patrick Junker: ÖKO-TEST press. In: oekotest.de. November 2015, accessed September 7, 2016 .
  10. ↑ Mathias Jäger: Utopia - Sustainability does not have to remain a utopia. In: Hamburg Startups. April 3, 2019, accessed on June 18, 2019 (German).
  11. ↑ Peter Plieninger, in turn, is responsible for the foreword and the processing of the memoirs of his grandfather: Karl J. Freudenberg (author), Peter and Herta Plieninger (foreword, processing): '' Looking back on a long life: Memories of the chemist Karl Johann Freudenberg 1886 -1983 '', Kurpfälzischer Verlag, Heidelberg, 1999, ISBN 3-924566-08-9 . For experiments in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, in which the Freudenberg company was also involved and which Peter Plieninger is also involved in clarifying, see: Anne-Sophie Lang: Blut im Schuh
  12. ↑ Curiosity: illustrated magazine with Öko-Test in the magazine database : 9755-x
  13. ↑ References to this test can still be found online: A BRIEF HISTORY OF GREENPEACE (LONDON) . Reference is made to this on the website Cadmium in LEGO bricks in 2012
  14. ↑ In addition to the German Wikipedia article, the article with the same wording in the English edition should also be observed.
  15. ↑ Jürgen Rüsselel was head of the economic department at concrete and wanted to organize a works council in the editorial office. He was then dismissed by Klaus Rainer Röhl , owner, publisher and editor-in-chief. Specifically = K 2 r, DER SPIEGEL 34/1969
  16. ^ ÖKO-TEST-Verlag GmbH & Co KG: participation prospectus , p. 5
  17. ^ ÖKO-TEST-Verlag GmbH & Co KG: participation prospectus , p. 5
  18. ↑ In his book, published in 2007, Hannes Koch quotes allegations made against ÖKO-TEST-Magazin that the tests have only limited use, that “bio” is reduced to “low in pollutants” and that the social background of production is ignored. The reply from Jürgen Stellpflug, the editor-in-chief of ÖKO-TEST magazine, that social conditions cannot be properly controlled because they cannot be clearly analyzed due to the lack of clear criteria and consequently cannot be presented in a comprehensible manner, Koch considers simplifying. He sees the reduction of the tests to the question "pollutants - yes or no?" Primarily as a strategy for increasing the circulation that is effective for the public. Hannes Koch: Social Capitalists. , P. 149. At least with regard to the question of the extent to which a company fulfills its social responsibility and the aspect of sustainability in production, a learning process seems to have taken place in the meantime, as the following section "Test work" shows.
  19. ↑ Jürgen Rauschel: How it all started. In: Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 24
  20. ↑ The poster is printed by Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 25
  21. ↑ ÖKO-TEST-Verlag GmbH & Co KG: participation prospectus , p. 4
  22. ↑ Jürgen Rüsselel dates the development of this term and the related concept to the summer of 1982: Jürgen Rauscher: How everything began. In: Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 25.
  23. ↑ Jürgen Rauschel: How it all started. In: Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 27
  24. ↑ Association of Organic Research Institute (AGÖF eV)
  25. ↑ Jürgen Rauschel: How it all started. In: Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 31
  26. ↑ Less, but better design in Frankfurt 1925 to 1985
  27. ↑ Everything new! 100 Years of New Typography and New Graphics in Frankfurt am Main ( Memento of the original from March 26, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.museumangewandtekunst.de
  28. ↑ The BRAUN Design Collection
  29. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 37
  30. ↑ In this context, Gassner does not dispute that this claim to autonomy was not undisputed and prone to conflict. In a video on PAGE-online from April 2011 (see web link) he jokingly speaks of the fact that his snow-white hair is the result of these constant arguments with the editorial team and the publisher. On the other hand, if he suggests ( everyday ecology design , p. 37) that it was precisely this different design that led to the breakthrough of the ÖKO-TEST magazine and the sold circulation of 100,000 copies in 1988, then it should this statement does not agree with reality. The mentioned number of copies in 1988 had much more tangible reasons: On April 26, 1986 the Chernobyl reactor exploded, which in the following period had a very strong influence on the topic of ÖKO-TEST magazine and attracted new readers. For the relatively young magazine, one can therefore easily adopt the assessment that comes from the taz.die tageszeitung : “Then Chernobyl happened and - the newly acquired readers all remained loyal to us. The kiosk sales also went up steeply, which had a completely different meaning back then. After Chernobyl it went on like this. [..] It may sound cynical, but Chernobyl came at exactly the right time for the taz. ”(Taz.am weekend, April 23/24, 2016, p. 16).
  31. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 37.
  32. ↑ Steinbeis Papers ( Memento of the original from May 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.stp.de
  33. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 41
  34. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 58
  35. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 66
  36. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 86
  37. ↑ Jürgen Rauschel: How it all started. In: Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 31
  38. ↑ In Wikipedia he is only present through his film The Bride (1971) ; some of his drawings can be found on the page filmography and pictures by Borislav Šajtinac
  39. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 38
  40. ↑ Monika Osberghaus: The cry for refatting - Gabriele Lorenzer photographs green oases of the soul
  41. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 124
  42. ↑ Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 124
  43. ^ The meanwhile no longer existing HTS Hagenovia Treuhand GmbH Steuerberatungsgesellschaft
  44. ↑ The first address of the publisher was a badly run-down rear building in Schwanthalerstr. 59 in Frankfurt-Sachsenhausen. The previous tenant was the Kreisverband Frankfurt der GRÜNEN, which had relocated its headquarters to Mainzer Landstrasse 147, the KBW building , to which ÖKO-TEST Verlag moved in 1988.
  45. ↑ Jürgen Rauschel: How it all started. In: Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 35
  46. ↑ Jürgen Rauschel: How it all started. In: Christof Gassner (ed.): Everyday Ecology Design , p. 35
  47. ↑ Hannes Koch: Social Capitalists. S. 147. A personality story that is equal to Jürgen Rauschel's first-person depiction of history can be found on the page: 25 years of ÖKO-TEST portrait of Jürgen Stellpflug
  48. ↑ Hannes Koch: Social Capitalists. P. 140
  49. ^ Register portals of the federal states at Hagen District Court, HRB 51211, Frankfurt am Main District Court
  50. ↑ [1] ÖKO-TEST sets the course for the future. Change in the top of the publishing house and chief editor
  51. ↑ [2] New management at Öko-Test: specialist for trade magazines takes over the helm at consumer magazine
  52. ↑ Gregor Eisenhauer: Obituary for Jürgen Rauschel Der Tagesspiegel, July 22, 2005
  53. ↑ Monika Gerigk
  54. ↑ rotthaus.com . On the author page of the Campus Verlag it also says: “Stephan Rotthaus, banker and business journalist, has been dealing with green investments for over 25 years. He is co-founder of the Ökofonds NRW and the magazine Öko-Test. ” Stephan Rotthaus He published the book at Campus: Successfully investing in green investments. Ecological - ethical - sustainable , Frankfurt, 2009, ISBN 9783593385785
  55. ↑ The common thread to the customer: Why customers really buy!
  56. ↑ One of these first employees was Petra Wedel, who moved from Krüger's company to ÖKO-TEST Verlag and now runs the "Zweiplus Medienagentur" in Darmstadt. 2+ Media Agency ( Memento of the original from May 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.zweiplus.de
  57. ↑ At that time he was still a student, worked in an environmental shop in Bonn and from 2008 was press officer at the Federal Environment Ministry.
  58. ↑ bio verlag gmbh: History and Ronald Steinmeyer leaves bio verlag
  59. ↑ He later worked for the "metallzeitung", the members' newspaper of IG Metall, and now lives as a freelance journalist near Frankfurt.
  60. ↑ On twitter he describes himself as a "journalist, philosopher, IT specialist. Life artist. “ Werner W. Metzger
  61. ↑ He was already responsible for culture in the ÖKO-TEST magazine and now lives in Düsseldorf. In 2015 he published a new book about the notorious serial killer Dieter Kürten: Hanno Parmentier: Der Würger von Düsseldorf. The life and deeds of the serial killer Peter Kürten. Sutton Verlag GmbH, Erfurt, 2015, ISBN 978-3-95400-178-1
  62. ↑ Today she works as a reporter for the Hessischer Rundfunk (hr) and runs the website People and Stories from the Odenwald
  63. ↑ Today he works as the state media secretary for Lower Saxony-Bremen of the German Union of Journalists
  64. ↑ Today he is the “Head of Marketing, Administration and Finance” at Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH). See also: The heads of the DUH
  65. ↑ ÖKO-TEST-Verlag GmbH & Co KG: '' Participation prospectus '', p. 11
  66. ↑ Jürgen Rüsselel: '' How it all began. '' In: Christof Gassner (ed.): '' Everyday Ecology Design '', p. 33
  67. ↑ About ÖKO-TEST - Independence ( Memento of the original dated February 3, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Retrieved February 13, 2015 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.oekotest.de
  68. ↑ About ÖKO-TEST - test selection ( memento of the original from February 3, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.oekotest.de
  69. ↑ ÖKO-Test - This is how a test is created ( Memento of the original from February 3, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Retrieved February 13, 2015 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.oekotest.de
  70. ↑ ÖKO-Test - This is how a test is created ( Memento of the original from February 3, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Retrieved February 13, 2015 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.oekotest.de
  71. ↑ ÖKO-Test - This is how a test is created ( Memento of the original from February 3, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.oekotest.de
  72. ↑ About ÖKO-TEST - test criteria . Retrieved October 26, 2017
  73. ↑ Öko-Test. Test children's toys . November 26, 2010. Retrieved January 6, 2010.
  74. ↑ laboratory journal. [3] . March 2004. Retrieved February 26, 2019
  75. ↑ Ökotest in the sights of the public prosecutor's office. In: SWR Aktuell. July 16, 2019, accessed July 16, 2019 .
  76. ↑ Christoph Giesen, Klaus Ott: Raid on "Öko-Test" "Maliciously deceived". In: Süddeutsche Zeitung. July 17, 2019, accessed July 17, 2019 .
  77. ↑ Christoph Giesen, Klaus Ott: "Öko-Test" under suspicion. In: SZ-Online. January 29, 2019, accessed January 30, 2019 .
  78. ↑ Consumer magazine suspected fraud in "Öko-Test" , By Mischa Ehrhardt Deutschlandfunk January 30, 2019.
  79. ↑ Failed expansion of the magazine "Öko-Test" in China , by Anne Seith, Der Spiegel January 30, 2019.
  80. ↑ according to IVW , fourth quarter in each case ( details on ivw.eu )
  81. ↑ according to IVW , fourth quarter in each case ( details on ivw.eu )