Trigema boss Wolfgang Grupp is 80 years old - these are his most striking sayings

Trigema boss Wolfgang Grupp is 80 years old - these are his most striking sayings Luca Schallenberger Mon Apr 4, 2022 10:00 AM Reading Time: 5 min Today, April 4th, Wolfgang Grupp is celebrating his 80th birthday in the United Arab Emirates of Dubai. He can now look back on more than 50 years as managing director and owner of the textile manufacturer Trigema, which he took over from his father in 1969. Not in particularly good condition, by the way. Because his father, Franz Grupp, put the company on a broader footing, but overreached himself and slipped into the red. Wolfgang Grupp refocused the company on its core business and thus led it back into the profit zone. In addition to his entrepreneurial success, Grupp also became known for his advertising with the Trigema monkey in front of the "Tagesschau" and talk show appearances as well as pithy sayings that he repeatedly said in interviews and still does. Business Insider rounded up his seven sayings that stuck in our minds. 1. "Whoever has a big problem is a failure" In an interview with us last year, Grupp made it clear what he thinks of people with big problems. Namely nothing. "Whoever has a big problem is a failure," he said. The reason: Every problem was small and if the person concerned had solved it as a small one, "he wouldn't have had a big one," says Grupp. 2. "Anyone who goes bankrupt for billions and then remains a billionaire and lets the taxpayer pay for the billions in losses is not an entrepreneur for me." Wolfgang Grupp and Trigema still produce in Germany, a comparatively expensive location for the production of clothing. However, it has always been important for Grupp to show responsibility and loyalty to its employees, who are also known as the "company family" at Trigema. In turn, he has no understanding for the following entrepreneurs: “Anyone who goes bankrupt for billions and then remains a billionaire and lets the taxpayer pay for the billions in losses is not an entrepreneur for me. He is an exploiter,” he said on the ARD talk show “Maischberger”. 3. "We don't throw away a piece of bread because it's tough." Grupp's loyalty goes so far that he would even be willing to personally tighten his belt for his company. In a double interview together with the investor Frank Thelen, Grupp told the "Wirtschaftswoche": "They (meant: entrepreneurs, editor's note) eat dry bread when the company is not doing well. Not because they cannot pay for the butter , but because the money is in better hands with the company at the moment." And speaking of bread. According to him, that too is not thrown away, even if it is hard. In an interview with "Focus Online" he said: "We don't throw away a piece of bread because it's hard. Before the new bread is cut, the old one has to be eaten." 4. "No matter how old I am, my wife should always be in her early 20s" Grupp is also loyal to his wife - since 1988, the year they got married. It once coqueted: "No matter how old I am, my wife should always be in her early 20s," said Grupp on the ZDF talk show "Markus Lanz" looking back on his choice of partner. Apparently he did that too. When he met his wife Elisabeth Grupp, he was 44 years old and Elisabeth just 19. They met while hunting: Wolfgang Grupp killed an animal in Austria on the territory of his current father-in-law - that's how Elisabeth and Wolfgang Grupp got talking . Incidentally, four years earlier, at the age of 40, Grupp had not believed in marriage. One night he dreamed that he was married and woke up bathed in sweat. 5. "To me, Twitter is just plain stupid" Group and social media? Two worlds collide here. As we found out last year during our visit to Burladingen, the company's headquarters, Grupp only works with pen and paper. He doesn't have a computer, he prints out e-mails and puts them on his large wooden desk, which is in the middle of an open-plan office. So it's no wonder that he doesn't think much of social networks, especially Twitter: "For me, Twitter is just stupid, and the people who use it are idiots for me," said Grupp, according to a report by the " Tagesspiegel" in 2010. He later weakened the statement. 6. "The world has gotten a little crazier and all this shit is from America" So it's clear that Wolfgang Grupp doesn't think much of the internet. But he doesn't think much of startups or their attitude to work either. When things are going well, people would cash in, when things were going badly, they gave up, he says in the “Chef Talk” podcast of “Wirtschaftswoche” at the beginning of February. You need responsible start-ups.