Bierbaum Proenen

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Bierbaum Proenen

logo
legal form GmbH & Co. KG
founding 1788
Seat Cologne
management Harald Goost
Number of employees A total of approx. 360, of which approx. 250 are in-house in Tunisia
sales 51.2 million euros (2018)
Branch textiles
Website www.bp-online.com/de

The current headquarters of BP in Cologne
Seamstress at the buttonhole machine, 1953
Assembly line production Bierbaum-Proenen, 1938

Bierbaum-Proenen is a Cologne-based manufacturer of work clothes .

Bierbaum-Proenen sells personal protective equipment (PPE) and work clothing for industry, trade, healthcare and the catering trade under the BP brand in Europe .

Bierbaum-Proenen is an owner-managed family business in the seventh generation and employs 110 people at its headquarters in Cologne. Approx. 250 people are employed in our own Tunisian production plant, Vetra. In addition, the workwear is manufactured by production partners in North Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia.

Corporate responsibility

Bierbaum-Proenen has been a member of the multi-stakeholder initiative Fair Wear Foundation since 2010 . The aim of the Fair Wear Foundation is to improve working conditions for people who work in the international clothing industry. BP has been awarded the status of "Fair Wear Leader" six times in a row.

Bierbaum-Proenen has been participating in the Fairtrade cotton program since 2016 and purchases ten percent of its cotton under these conditions. This program enables smallholders to sell more cotton on Fairtrade terms.

Bierbaum-Proenen is also a member of the “ Alliance for Sustainable Textiles ”. The government initiative of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development aims to secure social, ecological and economic standards in the entire production and trade chain of the clothing industry.

history

Johann Baptist Bierbaum settled in 1788 as a linen dealer in Mühlengasse in Cologne. His company is one of the few Cologne companies that has existed without interruption since the 18th century. His son-in-law, Franz Arnold Proenen, was a dyer and owner of a printing shop for self-made woolen fabrics . Both companies were merged under the name Bierbaum-Proenen. Over time, the company developed into a wholesaler.

In 1905 the company moved into the new location on Domstrasse in Cologne, where the focus gradually shifted from wholesaling to the modern series production of lingerie and workwear. In April 1914, Franz Proenen, the fourth generation representative, visited the Ford factory in Detroit with its world-famous assembly line . The intention to transfer assembly line production to the manufacture of work clothes could not be implemented by the First World War .

It was not until 1929, 15 years later, that Bierbaum-Proenen began implementing it as one of the first clothing companies in Germany. At first there was resistance among the workers to the plans. But the resistance to assembly line work could be overcome through higher wages . The hitherto predominant homework was finally given up; the variety of articles reduced and standardized. This was the prerequisite for the mass production of work clothes on the assembly line. The assembly line work has reduced manufacturing costs and increased quality to a previously unknown extent .

At the same time, BP was introduced as a quality brand for workwear and registered as a brand in 1927.

In April 1933 and October 1935 the three owners joined the NSDAP . There is no evidence of membership in ADEFA , the "Arbeitsgemeinschaft Deutscher (1934: German-Aryan) manufacturers of the clothing industry ." The manufacture of party clothing (brown shirts, SA and party uniforms, etc.) played a rather subordinate role. Approx. between 1934 and 1943 four percent of total sales were made in the manufacture of party clothing. The adherence to the Jewish patent attorney Moritz Bing brought Franz Proenen, one of the owners, a party exclusion procedure. Moritz Bing worked for Bierbaum-Proenen until his emigration in 1938. It could not be clarified without a doubt why Bierbaum-Proenen no longer supplied the Jewish mail order company Siegbert Wilmersdörfer in 1938. 70 other German and Austrian manufacturers that Wilmersdörfer wrote to also refused to deliver. It is possible that there were doubts about the solvency of the Jewish customers endangered by the National Socialist Aryanization policy. Willingness to adapt to the conditions of the system was evident in the establishment of a group of BP factories. Bierbaum-Proenen employed more than 1,000 people before the outbreak of war. During the war, two Ukrainian and seven Belarusian female forced laborers worked in the company for about three months.

The Second World War led to the extensive destruction of the business on Domstrasse. It was not until the beginning of the 1950s that the reconstruction was largely completed and a stable core workforce was back in place.

In the 1960s, fashionable elements were incorporated into women's medical work clothing and production techniques (bundling system) were further modernized.

Due to globalization , commercial jobs were relocated abroad in the 1980s and 1990s. In addition, the logistics were transferred to an external service provider .

Web links

Commons : Textilfabrik Bierbaum-Proenen  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Locations

In addition to the Cologne site, Bierbaum-Proenen has its own production site in Mateur, Tunisia, and also works with production partners in North Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia.

literature

  • Helmut Vogt : Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 .
  • Mario Kramp , Marcus Trier (eds.): Above and below: The Eigelstein . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2014, ISBN 978-3-7616-2706-8 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ BP annual financial statements 2018
  2. ↑ a b Compass Sustainability Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises: BP Bierbaum-Proenen, GmbH & Co. KG. (PDF; 90 kB) Retrieved July 13, 2012 .
  3. ↑ Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung: "People want to look good at work." from February 12, 2014 by Christine Scharrenbroch
  4. ↑ Fair Wear Foundation: Brand Performance Check - Bierbaum-Proenen 2015, p. 2. (PDF) Retrieved on February 28, 2017 .
  5. ↑ bp-online.com
  6. ↑ RW Textilservice: "Commitment to sustainability." - Issue 6, June 2016 - page 58.
  7. ↑ bp-online.com (PDF)
  8. ↑ Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development: Wave of accession to the textile alliance - leading companies declare membership. Retrieved February 28, 2017 .
  9. ↑ Mario Kramp, Marcus Trier (Ed.): Above and Above: The Egg Stone . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2014, ISBN 978-3-7616-2706-8 , p. 207 .
  10. ↑ Helmut Vogt: Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 , p. 9 .
  11. ↑ Helmut Vogt: Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 , p. 12 .
  12. ↑ Jürgen Bönig: The introduction of assembly line work in Germany by 1933 . tape 1 . Bauwelt-Verlag, 1935, p. 182 ( Google Books ).
  13. ^ Register information , German Patent and Trademark Office
  14. ↑ Helmut Vogt: Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 , p. 46 .
  15. ↑ a b Helmut Vogt: Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 , p. 69-70 .
  16. ↑ Helmut Vogt: Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 , p. 55 .
  17. ↑ Helmut Vogt: Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 , p. 82-83 .
  18. ↑ hagalil.com
  19. ↑ Monthly booklets for architecture and urban planning . tape 19 . Bauwelt-Verlag, 1935, p. 316 ( Google Books ).
  20. ↑ Helmut Vogt: Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 , p. 100 .
  21. ↑ Helmut Vogt: Bierbaum-Proenen 1929–1952. A family business during the Great Depression, National Socialism and Reconstruction . 1st edition. JP Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-7616-2606-1 , p. 132 .
  22. ^ Renate Schindler-Tiedemann: Long-term partnership in logistics. (No longer available online.) FIEGE Logistik Holding Stiftung, formerly the original ; Retrieved April 26, 2017 .  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.fiege.at