Rudolph_Karstadt

Rudolph Karstadt

Rudolph Karstadt

German entrepreneur

Rudolph Karstadt (16 February 1856 – 15 December 1944 in Schwerin) was a German entrepreneur.

Rudolph Karstadt plaque at the first Karstadt department store in Wismar
Exlibris Karstadt

Biography

Karstadt was born in Grevesmühlen near Lübeck on 16 February 1856, he apprenticed in Rostock and then worked in his father’s textile shop in Schwerin.[1]

With a loan of 1000 thaler from his father and with the help of his two sisters, Karstadt opened his first store, ″Tuch-, Manufaktur- und Konfektionsgeschäft" at the Krämerstr. 4 in Wismar on 14 May 1881.[2]

In 1919 Karstadt AG and Theodor Althoff KG merged.[1]

By 1920 he owned over 30 shops across Germany. The Karstadt Warenhaus AG, which is what his chain of stores was called by 1920, continues as Arcandor.

Karstadt lost most of his private fortune in the Great Depression and left the board of the Karstadt AG in 1932.[3]

References

  1. [1]
    "Karstadt Quelle AG | Encyclopedia.com". www.encyclopedia.com. Retrieved 2022-02-23.
  2. [2]
    "14. Mai 2006 - Vor 125 Jahren: Rudolph Karstadt eröffnet sein erstes Geschäft". Westdeutscher Rundfunk (in German). Retrieved 24 February 2013.
  3. [3]
    "Deutsche Biographie" (in German). Retrieved 2022-11-05.

Further reading

See also


Stub icon

This German business-related biographical article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
Share this article:

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Rudolph_Karstadt, and is written by contributors. Text is available under a CC BY-SA 4.0 International License; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.