“Architecture is one of the ten, perhaps one of the six most important things in life,” Kurt Ernsting once said. In all his construction projects, he always wanted to give his employees a real sense of pleasure, without disguising the fact that they were working here. “Architecture must be there for people,” was his motto. For example, even though our distribution centres in Coesfeld-Lette and Klieken and our Regional Centre in Schwarzenbek have similar functions, they have been deliberately made to look different. Our architecture must fit perfectly into the surrounding environment and region.
Our 150,000 square metre company campus is located in Coesfeld-Lette, Münsterland. It consists of an ensemble of buildings designed by David Chipperfield, Bruno Reichlin, Fabio Reinhart and Santiago Calatrava and is now well-known to architecture fans all over the world. In addition to a large distribution centre, our company head office is also located here. We call this our Service Centre. It is home to a wide variety of departments: employees from Design, IT, Procurement, E-commerce, Marketing, PR, Accounting, Human Resources and many other departments work together here with the goal of making our customers happy every day.
As the name suggests, the building is used by the creative departments at Ernsting's family, which work hand in hand to develop new collections and products - from the initial idea to the delivery of the goods. This includes the Design, Category Management, Quality Development, Procurement and Procurement Logistics departments.
Our distribution centre in Coesfeld-Lette takes care of all the tasks surrounding the goods-distribution of all articles at Ernsting’s family. Products manufactured all over the world are temporarily stored here, checked for quality and then picked for deliveries to stores and Internet orders.
Our distribution centre in Klieken also represents our high aspiration for an aesthetically-implemented level of functionality and work. As this centre is responsible for supplying 900 stores in Germany and Austria, many employees work here every day to ensure the success of Ernsting’s family. Perfectly integrated into the landscape, the 50,000 m² complex, which is also home to a high-bay warehouse, fulfils all the tasks for efficient logistics.
As a regional centre near the port of Hamburg, our 3,000 m² building fulfils all the same tasks as its “big brothers” in Lette and Klieken. With an unconventional architectural principle, the building not only fulfils important logistical requirements but also creates a high-quality working environment for its employees.