Award as a volunteer-friendly employer

Last week on Mon­day, Car­olin Grim­bach­er, man­ag­ing part­ner of SÜDPACK, and Johannes Rem­mele, own­er and part­ner, accept­ed the “Vol­un­teer-friend­ly employ­er in civ­il pro­tec­tion” award in Alb­stadt. The prize, which is award­ed annu­al­ly by the state of Baden-Würt­tem­berg, was pre­sent­ed this year to 32 com­pa­nies that pro­mote vol­un­teerism in every respect and active­ly sup­port their employ­ees in per­form­ing vol­un­teer work in civ­il protection.

In the fire depart­ment, in res­cue ser­vices or in aid orga­ni­za­tions — vol­un­teers help in dis­as­ter oper­a­tions and acci­dents, they care for injured peo­ple or help fight fires.

“They are there for oth­ers in an emer­gency — and delib­er­ate­ly put them­selves in dan­ger to save fel­low human beings. Such men and women are our every­day heroes.”

- Thomas Strobl Deputy Min­is­ter President

The Group was among the com­pa­nies hon­ored on the day. Pre­vi­ous­ly, aid orga­ni­za­tions and munic­i­pal­i­ties had sub­mit­ted pro­pos­als from which the Min­istry of the Inte­ri­or, Dig­i­tal­iza­tion and Munic­i­pal­i­ties select­ed this year’s award win­ners. The rec­om­men­da­tion was made by the Ochsen­hausen fire department.

Car­olin Grim­bach­er, who received the award togeth­er with Johannes Rem­mele, express­ly empha­sizes that “for Süd­pack, as a fam­i­ly-owned com­pa­ny deeply root­ed in the region, it is a mat­ter of course to inspire our employ­ees to vol­un­teer and to cre­ate the nec­es­sary struc­tures inter­nal­ly so that civ­il defense can demon­strate its full capa­bil­i­ties in an emergency.”

A total of around 25 employ­ees in the com­pa­ny are cur­rent­ly active as vol­un­teers in a wide range of fields. In the event of an alarm or emer­gency, the vol­un­teers are giv­en unbu­reau­crat­ic leave of absence. In addi­tion, the Group sup­ports fur­ther train­ing mea­sures and helps to ensure that vol­un­teer­ing is gen­er­al­ly rec­og­nized and not tak­en for granted.

Johannes Rem­mele is also pleased with the wide-rang­ing com­mit­ment of the employ­ees and refers to the long tra­di­tion of vol­un­teer­ing. After all, “through­out the entire West­ern tra­di­tion, from antiq­ui­ty to the present day, vol­un­teerism, i.e. the indi­vid­ual and altru­is­tic con­tri­bu­tion of an indi­vid­ual or a group, is an indis­pens­able ele­ment for the com­mon good. We are there­fore very, very hap­py to sup­port those who take respon­si­bil­i­ty for them­selves, their fel­low human beings, soci­ety and the envi­ron­ment. This is also ful­ly in line with the val­ues and goals that the com­pa­ny has set for itself.”

Ochsen­hausen’s May­or Andreas Den­zel, Mem­ber of the Ger­man Par­lia­ment Josef Rief as well as Man­fred Betz, rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the Ochsen­hausen Fire Depart­ment accom­pa­nied Car­olin Grim­bach­er and Johannes Rem­mele to the award cer­e­mo­ny. May­or Den­zel expressed his grat­i­tude for the com­mit­ment as an hon­orary employ­er and the good coop­er­a­tion with the fire depart­ment Ochsenhausen.

Due to the ongo­ing Coro­na pan­dem­ic, the awards were pre­sent­ed in two sep­a­rate cer­e­monies this year: The first took place on Octo­ber 28 in Achern, the sec­ond on Novem­ber 8 in Albstadt.