Stiftung Warentest

Joint international investigations are generally carried out with members of the umbrella organisation International Consumer Research & Testing (ICRT), which is based in London. Thereby Stiftung Warentest is often responsible for the project supervision. In addition to Stiftung Warentest, the most important partner organisations are:

Consumentenbond, The Hague, the Netherlands

Consumer Reports, Yonkers, NY, USA

Test Achats / Euroconsumers, Brussels, Belgium

Investigation work

Stiftung Warentest carries out more than 200 comparative product tests and investigations of services from nearly all areas of everyday life every year. Since 2002, products and services on special limited offer, mainly by the discount retailer chains, have also been investigated every week and the results quickly published. Aspects of corporate social responsibility (CSR) have been a part of the investigations of some specified products since 2004. There is also a section on investigated medication ("Medikamente im Test"), which provides information about more than 9000 medicines and 175 areas of application.

Market researchers and scientific staff are employed by Stiftung Warentest with the responsibility for selecting the products and services and the carrying out of the investigations. Each investigation project must be approved of by the Advisory Council and discussed at a meeting with advisory experts representing consumers, industry, manufacturers / retailers and providers, as well as independent experts.

The investigations are not actually carried out by Stiftung Warentest's staff members themselves, but by independent external test institutes worldwide. Test samples are purchased anonymously in shops and not provided by the manufacturers.

After the tests and the evaluations have been completed, but before publication, details of the objective results are sent to the respective manufacturers and providers for verification and so that they can make their comments. Journalists then summarise the investigation results in a form which makes them easier to read and understand. Staff members who are specifically responsible for verification make sure the published reports and investigation results concur.

Up until December 2011, Stiftung Warentest had already published information about 5,300 investigations covering about 100,000 products and 2,137 services.

Investigation results on the website

Stiftung Warentest's website has all the investigation results starting in 2000, as well as current news, special online articles, an interactive calculator and free short versions of between eight and ten investigations per month. Downloading information costs between 75 cents and €2.50 for detailed investigation results, and a maximum of €5 for comprehensive product databases.