Consumers Association Forward

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The consumer association Vorwärts was a large Viennese consumer cooperative close to the SDAP around 1900.

A founding euphoria of Viennese consumer cooperatives by activists of the labor movement had led to a difficult situation around 1900. In 1901, many of these social democratic related consumer cooperatives were ready for bankruptcy.

Notwithstanding the warnings of Jakob Reumann and Franz Schuhmeiers , who had witnessed the collapse of the consumer association Brotherhood in Ottakring , the party decided on a forward strategy and closed the most endangered Viennese associations (Favoriten, Floridsdorf, Landstrasse, Simmering and the equality in Ottakring) in the spring of 1902 in the new cooperative forward together. The two established and flourishing cooperatives, the First Lower Austrian Workers' Consumption Association and the Fünfhauser Konsumverein viewed this development with skepticism.

From 1902 to 1907 the number of Vorwärts branches grew from 20 to 46 and the number of members tripled from 8,000 to over 25,000. The credit-financed expansion and fierce competition with the established consumer associations, the establishment of the Großeinkaufsgesellschaft für Österreichische Consumvereine ( GöC ) and that of the Hammerbrotwerke in 1905 threatened to result in a financial catastrophe. The forward functionary responsible for this development and director of GöC Benno Karpeles therefore had to leave the field. In 1912 Karl Renner founded the credit association of Austrian workers' associations with the help of the trade union , thus preventing a collapse by injecting capital. The operations were finally restructured through the seller's market of the First World War and through their integration into the war economy .

In 1920 the consumer association Vorwärts dissolved, as did the workers ' consumer association Fünfhaus and the workers' consumer association Donaustadt . These consumer associations gave their assets to the First Lower Austrian Workers' Consumption Association. After the members of the other consumer associations had joined him, he changed his name to Konsumgenossenschaft Wien und Umgebung (KGW) . The world's largest consumer cooperative with over 100,000 members was created.

Notes / individual evidence

  1. ↑ Andreas Vukovich: History of the consumer cooperative wholesale purchase in Austria , presented on behalf of the Großeinkaufsgesellschaftischer Österreichischer Consumvereine, Verlag der Großeinkaufsgesellschaft, propaganda department, print "Vorwärts", Vienna V, oJ (1931), p. 61.

literature

  • Johann Brazda , Siegfried Rom (Ed.): 150 years of consumer cooperatives in Austria . Vienna, 2006.
  • Andreas Vukovich : History of the large consumer cooperative purchasing in Austria , presented on behalf of the large purchasing company of Austrian consumer associations, publishing house of the large purchasing company, propaganda department, print "Vorwärts", Vienna V, undated (1931)

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