The story
In 1871, Carl Heinrich Hellmann founded a sole proprietorship in Osnabrück that transported goods by horse-drawn vehicles. One of the first customers was the steel mill in Georgsmarienhütte. Carl's sons Heinrich and Friedrich continued the business under Gebr. Hellmann from 1906. They passed their shares to their children and grandchildren in the following decades.
The company was almost completely destroyed during World War II and rebuilt in 1945 in Reichsbahn barracks in Osnabrück. In 1949, the first branch was opened in Hamburg, and in 1953, the second branch was added in Bremen. Hellmann was thus present at the two most important German ports.
By 1961, Hellmann had replaced the last horse-drawn wagons with modern vehicles. In 1976 and 1989, the cousins Klaus and Jost Hellmann took over the legacy of their fathers.
In 1976, Hellmann played a leading role in the founding of Deutscher Paket-Dienst (DPD). It was the first private provider to compete with the Bundespost. At the same time Hellmann accelerated internationalization and opened a branch in Hong Kong in 1982. The company has also been present in the United States since 1988. Hellmann continuously drove internationalization forward and today has 258 offices in 62 countries.
Since 1999, the company has been operating under Hellmann Worldwide Logistics. In 2018, the Hellmann family withdrew from active management of the company and handed it over to external management.
From Wikipedia’s article on Hellmann Worldwide Logistics, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4