On Friday, 28 September 2012, the Austrian branch of the Hamburg based STILL GmbH was celebrating its 50-year anniversary at its freshly modernised headquarters in Vienna Neudorf with more than 400 guests. The large number of customers and employees have been joined by the Major of Vienna Neudorf, Christian Wöhrleitner, the representative of the section of commerce in the Committee of the Austrian Federal Chamber of Commerce, Mrs. Bettina Lorentschitsch, and the Managing Director of the Lower Austria business agency ecoplus, Helmut Miernicki, who have personally attended the jubilee gala to honour the success of the company. Head of the Austrian branch is Helmuth Viertl. Being with the company for more than three decades, he is one of the most experienced heads of the Austrian intralogistics industry.

Founded in 1962 STILL Austria is the oldest of the 20 international branches now in service of the leading supplier for customized internal logistics. The story of the Austrian branch began in a small location in the Magdalenenstraße in the centre of Vienna. However, it did not take long and the space there became too small for the growing company. Consequently, in 1971, it relocated to a new location in the industrial estate in south Lower Austria in Vienna Neudorf where it still is located today and continuously growing. It was only this year, that the site has undergone an extensive modernisation. Besides a new design of the entire façade of the building and the erecting of new offices for various departments, a new showroom with 520m2 was built for the customers to now experience the STILL product portfolio live.
Key word customers: The list of STILL’s first international branch seems to list the complete “who is who” in the world of Austrian business, from local medium-size companies to huge industrial concerns everything is present. Since 1988, the Austrian branch is the only company not originating from Austria to bear the seal of the Austrian Code of Arms which is awarded by the Federal Minister for Economics to companies that have performed extraordinarily well for the Austrian economy.

And the Austrian branch more than deserved the award: Since its foundation, the company has been on the road of success. While in its year of establishment, the company employed 8 employees, the staff has by now grown to 108 employees. And, moreover, throughout its history there have not been any redundancies – a rare phenomena in our ever faster world of business. The company even emerged stronger from the financial crisis in 2009 than it had entered it, and in 2011 it could register the largest market shares and highest turnover for itself in the whole of its history. “The image of quality of STILL is known to everyone in Austria,” Helmuth Viertl, who has been a member of the STILL family since 1974, describes the good reputation the company has attained for itself over the years. This good reputation bases on the effort of our highly qualified employees and the innovative quality products that have made it possible again and again to differentiate from the competition and take a sustainable influence on the development of the industry. “For example, during the seventies the first free view mast was launched on the market by STILL. The same applies for the battery change over the side for electric trucks, launched in 2005. Now it has been several years that the talk is about hybrid propulsion. Again STILL is the first company to produce hybrid trucks in series,“ says Viertl, naming only a few examples. “STLL has always been a driver for innovations. That makes me proud until today”.

Viertl is also proud of the events at the jubilee gala itself that once again STILL succeeded to combine information and entertainment in an appealing way. For example by the discussion of a board panel which was moderated by the renowned intralogistics journalist Anita Würmser. Discussing on the panel were besides Helmuth Viertl also Thomas A. Fischer, member of the STILL Management Board, the Major of Vienna Neudorf, Christian Wöhrleitner, and the head of the Lower Austria business agency ecoplus, Helmut Miernicki. The discussion has taken the guests on a time journey through intralogistics, starting in the 60ies to the present – and from there on it gave the guests an impression of what the future may look like. A piece of musical theatre then awoke this vision of intralogistics to life on stage. Professional actors, songs individually composed for the show and many of the trucks from the STILL range including the concept car STILL cubeXX provided an insight into intelligent internal logistics not loosing the spirit of the gala event itself.

“With the gala, we wanted to thank our customers and staff and make clear that STILL is going to stand by their side as a reliable partner and employer in the coming 50 years as well,” Viertl comments the big jubilee event.