Stuttgart/Mannheim, April 12. 1995
Karl Feuerstein (54), Chairman of the Group Works Council and Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Daimler-Benz AG, Chairman of the General Works Council of Mercedes-Benz AG, and Chairman of the Works Council of the Mercedes-Benz plant at Mannheim, celebrated 40 years of company service on Wednesday, April 12, 1995. To mark the occasion, a small "party" was held the same day at the Mannheim plant. The reception in honor of Feuerstein was attended by more than 100 guests from industry, the unions, politics and society - among them the boards of management of Daimler-Benz AG and Mercedes-Benz AG, supervisory board members, representatives from IG Metall (Germany's largest union) and Mannheim's mayor Gerhard Widder.Feuerstein - born in 1940 in the Mannheim district of Käfertal - can look back on four decades of service characterized by an extremely active involvement in activities at Daimler-Benz. It was in 1955 that he first joined the company's Commercial Vehicle and Omnibus plant at Mannheim as as a sheet metal worker apprentice, before soon going on to become the chairman of the youth delegation. After serving his time, he worked for almost ten years on the shop-floor, initially in the production preparation workshop, then later in the bus body-in-white section. In 1963 he was elected to the works council, released from his work duties in 1967, and then elected chairman of the shop stewards' committee in 1974.
In 1989 Feuerstein took over all the official functions of his predecessor, paternal friend and companion of many years' standing, Herbert Lucy. These included Chairman of the Group Works Council of Daimler-Benz AG, Chairman of the General Works Council of Mercedes-Benz AG and Chairman of the Works Council of the Mannheim plant. A year later, he took over the post of Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board Committee of Mercedes-Benz AG and subsequently Daimler-Benz AG. In February 1995 he was also elected Chairman of the General Works Council of the Evobus GmbH bus company, which was jointly founded by Mercedes-Benz and Kässbohrer.
Parallel to his career as a workers' representative in the Daimler-Benz Group, Feuerstein was also involved in IG Metall, which he had joined as an apprentice in 1955. Positions here included member of the local executive since 1965, member of the general commission for collective wage agreement in 1974, and member of the negotiating committee in 1989. Feuerstein's political involvement is another aspect of a "classical career": 1957 member of the SPD; 1960 chairman of the local branch at Käfertal, where he has been on the ward executive since 1968; 1971 member of the SPD group on the Mannheim local council, where he has been active in numerous committees; 1974 - 1988 member of the regional executive; 1975 - 1989 deputy chairman of the local council; 1976 - 1990 chairman of the Mannheim district council; 1977 - 1988 member of the SPD state committee.
Further offices and memberships of various organizations such as the State Social Insurance Institution, Workers' Welfare, Friends of Nature, and the German Alpine Association complete the picture of the highly committed individual Karl Feuerstein.
Feuerstein summed up his career with typical clarity: "The greater part of my work has involved fighting to maintain and create jobs at the Mannheim plant. Looking back on my last few years as Chairman of the General Works Council of Mercedes-Benz AG and Chairman of the Group Works Council of Daimler-Benz AG, I am particularly proud of the "Rastatter Agreement," with which we were able to secure the production site for the planned Mercedes-Benz A-class car. We also succeeded with this agreement in managing redundancies in a socially acceptable manner during probably the greatest company crisis to date, and in providing all trainees with an indefinite contract. Compared with negative experiences made in previous periods of economic crisis, such achievements were - and still are - an important and encouraging signal for other companies too."
Helmut Werner, member of the Daimler-Benz Group Board of Management and Chairman of the Board of Management of Mercedes-Benz AG, acknowledged Feuerstein's contribution in the address he delivered personally.
The Chairman of the Daimler-Benz Group Board of Management, Edzard Reuter, said of Feuerstein: "He is a man with an eye for strategic necessities and, at the same time, an experienced pragmatist - firm, but reliable, and trustworthy. Karl Feuerstein knows what's feasible and when to compromise, and he always has the interests of the workforce in mind. By the same token, he never loses sight of what's good for the company as a whole."
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© 1995 Daimler-Benz