Reinhold Würth
Double-CoreTrait: Approx. 24,000 painted ASSY screws, hexagon nuts and bolts on wooden plate. original size 185 x 111 cm
When Reinhold Würth was 14 years old, his father, Adolf Würth, retired him from secondary school and hired him in 1949 as an apprentice and second employee at his wholesale company for screws in Künzelsau. He took him to the shop and took him with him on trips. So he learned selling from the bottom on.
When his father died, Reinhold Würth was 19 years old. After his retirement, at the age of 21, he took over the management of the company two years later. In the following decades, Würth succeeded in turning the regional trading company into a globally active company. His customers still come from the commercial and industrial sector. As the domestic market for fastening technology was always very fragmented and cyclical, Würth soon expanded its trade abroad. In 1962 the first foreign sales company was founded in the Netherlands. Only gradually, from 1975, Reinhold Würth started to produce his own products.
In 2017, 73 years after its foundation, the Würth Group now has more than 75,000 employees, with more than 400 companies, in over 80 countries. In fiscal year 2017, it generated sales of 12.7 billion euros, more than half of its total sales are generated abroad, and more than half of its permanent employees are employed in sales. In 1994 Reinhold Würth retired from operational management of the Würth Group and took over as Chairman of the Corporate Advisory Board until 2006.
In addition to business success, it has always been Reinhold Würth's self-image to be socially and culturally committed to society. Together with his wife, for example, he founded the Würth Foundation in 1987. Reinhold Würth is also extensively involved in the fields of art and culture, research and science, as well as education and upbringing.
Comment of the designer on the Würth-CoreTrait:
For all the CoreTraits I have produced, I have of course, before I dared to approach the design, thoroughly studied the vita of the respective personality. Reading the biographical texts about Mr Reinhold Würth, I was immediately fascinated by his "not entirely easy starting phase in 1956". As a young man, after his father's death, he was thrown straight into the deep end - and then such an extraordinary career. Simply incredible, fascinating, a role model for young people in every respect.
Therefore I spontaneously decided, inspired by a double photo with the young and the mature Reinhold Würth, which I discovered on the Internet, to make a double CoreTrait as an exception. And also the reduction to the initial product "screw" seemed almost too small after having read the "Würthchen Biografie" and today's broad product range.
On the other hand, "screw and nut" are a symbol of connection and that is what Reinhold Würth's life has always been about - connections between materials, between countries and continents and above all connections between people. In this form, the use of almost 24,000 original Würth screws and nuts that make up my double CoreTrait is easy to understand.
When his father died, Reinhold Würth was 19 years old. After his retirement, at the age of 21, he took over the management of the company two years later. In the following decades, Würth succeeded in turning the regional trading company into a globally active company. His customers still come from the commercial and industrial sector. As the domestic market for fastening technology was always very fragmented and cyclical, Würth soon expanded its trade abroad. In 1962 the first foreign sales company was founded in the Netherlands. Only gradually, from 1975, Reinhold Würth started to produce his own products.
In 2017, 73 years after its foundation, the Würth Group now has more than 75,000 employees, with more than 400 companies, in over 80 countries. In fiscal year 2017, it generated sales of 12.7 billion euros, more than half of its total sales are generated abroad, and more than half of its permanent employees are employed in sales. In 1994 Reinhold Würth retired from operational management of the Würth Group and took over as Chairman of the Corporate Advisory Board until 2006.
In addition to business success, it has always been Reinhold Würth's self-image to be socially and culturally committed to society. Together with his wife, for example, he founded the Würth Foundation in 1987. Reinhold Würth is also extensively involved in the fields of art and culture, research and science, as well as education and upbringing.
Comment of the designer on the Würth-CoreTrait:
For all the CoreTraits I have produced, I have of course, before I dared to approach the design, thoroughly studied the vita of the respective personality. Reading the biographical texts about Mr Reinhold Würth, I was immediately fascinated by his "not entirely easy starting phase in 1956". As a young man, after his father's death, he was thrown straight into the deep end - and then such an extraordinary career. Simply incredible, fascinating, a role model for young people in every respect.
Therefore I spontaneously decided, inspired by a double photo with the young and the mature Reinhold Würth, which I discovered on the Internet, to make a double CoreTrait as an exception. And also the reduction to the initial product "screw" seemed almost too small after having read the "Würthchen Biografie" and today's broad product range.
On the other hand, "screw and nut" are a symbol of connection and that is what Reinhold Würth's life has always been about - connections between materials, between countries and continents and above all connections between people. In this form, the use of almost 24,000 original Würth screws and nuts that make up my double CoreTrait is easy to understand.
