The woman behind haulage giant Fritz Fels: Nadine Beck is the granddaughter of the resourceful Fritz Fels junior and great‑granddaughter of the company founder. When her father passed away unexpectedly, she immediately knew: “Now it’s up to me to run our business.” Even though she had absolutely no intention of becoming a manager of a logistics company for moves, company relocations and machine transports …

From one day to the next, suddenly the head of a 90‑employee company – how do you manage that?
It’s like learning to swim in cold water: It has to be quick! And you have to stay calm, tackle the most important things first and work out the rest slowly. It was pretty difficult to juggle all that at the same time. But I have a team that takes responsibility and supports me in everything.

Were you immediately accepted as the boss?
Basically yes. But I also had to work on my employees gaining trust in me. Many have known me since I was a baby or drove a sweeper with me as a toddler. I grew up here, but I didn’t have much to do with the industry otherwise. I’ve already been actively involved in the company for two years, and now, suddenly, I’m the boss – that’s a huge change.

Do you regret the step?
As a young girl, I dreamed of becoming a vet. After completing my studies, I worked for other companies and only joined our family business after the birth of my son. When my dad died so suddenly, it was immediately clear to me: there are three generations before me, I’m not throwing that away!

You have certainly inherited a great legacy …
Yes, we have already achieved a lot. The relocation of the German Bundestag from Bonn to Berlin in 1999 comes to mind as a milestone. At that time my dad played a leading role here, working with a number of other companies. We were involved in the project for months. I was eight years old at the time and only know this from stories and photos. But it’s important that I don’t just rely on what the generations before me have achieved.

How do you want to run the business in the future?
I’m certain: you can’t stand still, you have to try to develop and implement new ideas all the time. Two examples: we have been offering vehicle transport for two years. And we are on the road with heated semitrailers that were built here. We are currently focusing internally on becoming even more digital. Our industry, especially in the furniture transport business, is still very paper based and is, let’s say, very old school overall. There’s a lot to do!