Hamburg companionship

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The Hamburg Kumpanei was the informal name for a group consisting of several newspaper publishers located in or around Hamburg, who have more or less worked together since the foundation of the Federal Republic due to complementary business interests. Even if the term friendship suggests solidarity, there was strong competitive thinking between the individual publishers: "We were called the 'Hamburger Kumpanei': left of center, each in his own way critical of the government, without fear of the wealthy in Bonn or elsewhere Kicking feet ". Gerd Bucerius , John Jahr , Richard Gruner and Rudolf Augstein and at least in the early days also Axel Springer are counted among the Hamburg buddies . Depending on the circumstances and the respective interests, they worked together on one or more joint projects, cross-shareholdings or even temporary mergers in order to stand up to a counterparty from their fellowship in publishing and economic terms. However, Springer already distanced himself from the other publishers in the late 1950s.

Diagram of the economic interdependencies of Hamburg's fellowship

Early cross-shareholdings

Since the 1950s, the individual publishing houses in the still young Federal Republic have grown steadily. The publishing house owners did not fail to participate in cross-shareholdings.

John Jahr ran the women's magazine Constanze with Axel Springer, who was his friend at the time . After both publishers originally owned half of the shares, Springer sold half of its shares to Jahr in 1955. In this way, Jahr became the majority owner with 75 percent. Axel Springer then held the remaining 25 percent of the shares in the magazine. In 1950, Jahr also took a 50 percent stake in Augstein's Spiegel publishing house. At that time, the news magazine Der Spiegel was relocated from Hanover to Hamburg and printed in the Springer publishing house.

Initially, there were no business ties between Bucerius and Springer. In 1950, Bucerius Springer offered a minority stake in ZEIT, which the latter refused. In 1951, Bucerius acquired additional shares in Stern-Verlag and thus owned 87.5 percent. Richard Gruner owned the remaining 12.5 percent. For a long time, the star was important for Bucerius in terms of publishing . His favorite child, ZEIT, was also his problem child. In 1955, internal editorial quarrels and declining print runs ensured that Bucerius toyed with the idea of ​​selling the newspaper to Axel Springer. The idea was to convert DIE ZEIT into a Sunday newspaper in this way. In this context, Bucerius also considered having the star managed by Springer-Verlag. Ultimately, these takeover considerations failed, mainly due to internal disputes between Bucerius and the shareholders of Zeit-Verlag.

German general newspaper and Bendestorfer contracts

At the end of 1959, Augstein pushed ahead with preparations for his own weekly newspaper under the title Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung. Jahr then sold half of his shares in Spiegel-Verlag to Gruner and Bucerius after Augstein did not have the financial means. The sale of the year to Bucerius and Gruner was officially justified by the fact that he wanted to concentrate more on his Constanze publishing house. However, Jahr had reservations about Rudolf Augstein's plan to compete with the weekly newspaper Die ZEIT . Augstein subsequently received 25 percent of Zeit Verlag. Axel Springer then made title claims from the Ullstein publishing house. The subsequent legal dispute was nevertheless amicably settled. The plans came to an end in 1960. These cross-shareholdings were regulated by the Bedtestorf contracts. In addition, they stated that none of the parties involved may relocate competing products. With this agreement, a loose amalgamation of Zeit, Stern and Spiegel took place for the first time.

Takeover of the Ullstein publishing house

The first clear cracks came in the course of the takeover of Ullstein AG .

Early on, Springer expressed his interest in the Ullstein publishing house in Berlin, which was already economically struggling. Other Hamburg publishers, such as the Munich Kindler Verlag, did not have the necessary capital or the will to invest in the Berlin publisher. Only time owner Bucerius already owned 10 percent of the publisher's shares in 1953. However, after Springer's serious interest became known, he sold them to the Hammerich & Lesser publishing house.

However, the relationship between Springer and Jahr tightened due to Springer's takeover efforts. Jahr had previously expressed serious interest together with Springer and felt ignored after he went it alone. At the beginning of 1959, the last resistance of the owners of the Ullstein publishing house to planned share purchases by Springer disappeared and in December 1959 the Ullstein heirs sold their shareholding to Springer via the most renowned German newspaper company.

Relations initially relaxed again when Jahr was able to take over the rival paper to Constanze, Brigitte from the Ullstein publishing house and Springer sold his last shares in Constanze, which he founded together with Jahr, to him in 1960. Springer also put the plans for a potential rival paper to Bucerius' Stern, the new creation of the Berliner Illustrirten, on hold.

Tensions within fellowship

At the beginning of the 1960s, all of the Kumpanei's publishers were looking for market shares, individual newspapers and magazines, or entire publishing houses. It was the time when there was a “cannibalism of the great publishers”. Within a short period of time, Springer had developed into the most powerful and willing to expand of the major German publishers. After the market distribution for a long time looked like Jahr, Bucerius and Augstein, with a few exceptions, mainly dominated the magazine sector and Springer was the leader in the newspaper sector, this almost tacit agreement was lifted when Springer entered the magazine sector by creating appropriate titles (jasmine) or buying up (parents). With the purchase of the Kindler & Schiermeyer publishing house, Springer also owned the very successful youth magazine Bravo . As a result, Springer was confronted with the charge of having a press monopoly.

The first attempt to unite the liberal papers through cross-shareholdings and thus ultimately to counterbalance the powerful Springer publishing house, ultimately failed because of the differing views of the participating editors Augstein and Bucerius. They dissolved their cross-shareholding in 1962. Augstein also toyed with the idea of ​​selling his shares in Stern and in 1963 offered Springer his shares in Nannen-Verlag, at least 87.5 percent. Springer was quite interested. Co-partner Gruner, however, was opposed to the trade, so that it could not be realized.

The Gruner + Jahr GmbH & Co. KG

In 1965, a merger of the big Hamburg publishers finally emerged. The three entrepreneurs John Jahr and Richard Gruner as well as Gerd Bucerius signed a contract that created Gruner + Jahr GmbH & Co. KG . When it was founded, Gruner owned 39.5 percent, Jahr 32.25 percent and Bucerius 28.25 percent. The objects Stern, Constanze, Brigitte, Die ZEIT and Capital have now been relocated under the umbrella of this GmbH. With the merger of these publishers, Gruner + Jahr became the second largest group in the German publishing industry.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Summer: Expropriate? To stop! . In: The time . No. 25/2009.
  2. ↑ Schwarz, p. 226.
  3. ↑ Schwarz, p. 227.
  4. ↑ von Arnim, p. 168.
  5. ↑ Schwarz, p. 295.
  6. ↑ Dahrendorf, p. 178.
  7. ↑ Dahrendorf, pp. 167–171.
  8. ↑ von Arnim, p. 169.