Dear friends,

One year of war and it is like so often in life: Habit is merciless. It makes people indifferent to things, no matter how terrible they are. A year ago, what was happening in Eastern Europe was inconceivable. Today it hasn’t disappeared from our perception, but it is suffocated by everyday life, has become a habit. At least in Germany. For the people on the ground, this is not true at all. There is war there every day anew, in all its atrociousness. We can and must never forget that.

Against this background, a look at our markets. We see a clear difference between the situation before and after the start of the war. Currently, we are experiencing an almost stagnant market in the area of residential construction. Energy costs, labor costs and the resulting inflation, plus high construction interest rates and the resulting drop in demand for real estate, are leading to a marked reluctance to invest. We experience and feel this every day.

But now we are in March, which will hopefully also prove itself as the first month of spring this year – with sunshine, longer days and the spirit of optimism this creates every year. The optimism associated with this is not pure wishful thinking, because the demand for living space in Germany is immense. A lack of affordable housing is fundamentally socially explosive, which is why a political response is needed here. And it’s not just new housing that is lacking; there is also a great need to renovate older buildings. The focus is often on energy-related measures, which also include facades and entrance areas. That’s where our mailboxes hang or stand. They are modern, of high quality, and available at reasonable prices. We are also seeing a significant increase in the area of digitalization, and we are well positioned there with our sophisticated solutions for parcel and goods acceptance and distribution. So we’re not just letting ourselves be carried along by the optimism of spring, we’re driving it forward with a lot of energy and joy.

Don’t let it get you down either, stay cheerful and see the good things without forgetting everything else.

I wish you a wonderful start to my favorite time of year.

 

Sincerely, Thomas Kolbe