I thoroughly enjoyed my time as a trainee. It was hard work and challenging, but we were given a lot of support. After the traineeship, I joined the still rather small export department of Hettich Beschläge GmbH in Bünde. With the merging of the sales activities of several companies, the department grew rapidly. The slogan was "Hettich plus Four". The department subsequently relocated to Vlotho and international business expanded rapidly.
Military service took me away from Hettich. When I returned, I spent about a year gaining practical experience in the international sales department at Hettich Marketing and Sales in Kirchlengern before moving back to Hettich Beschläge in Vlotho.

In 1994, I became a team leader and took on the responsibility for back office sales support for southern Germany. The work provided stimulating and diverse tasks, and experience in people management.

Shortly before Christmas 1998, I was in a meeting when the telephone rang. Our CEO Mr Breitenkamp asked whether anybody was interested in spending some time in Hong Kong to support the Hettich business there. This sounded too good an opportunity to miss, so I said, "yes" on an impulse.
After a couple of days to think it over and a trip to Asia to get some idea of the local situation, I was keener than ever to go. This was the start of two fascinating and exciting years in Hong Kong, Zhuhai and Shanghai. International colleagues, who had been voices on the phone, became firm friends.

Now I am involved in a number of projects addressing the international development of the Hettich Do-It-Yourself and Professional divisions. As a key user I participated actively in the introduction of SAP at Hettich FurnTech.
I'm already looking forward to the challenges that are waiting for me tomorrow…

Marco Dörner
Manager Sales Support
International