The History of the Klett Group: Four Generations of Success

1921-1935
The 1920s saw Klett publish its first schoolbooks for the Württemberg region of southwest Germany. Fritz Klett also joined the company in 1921. Along with his father, Ernst Klett (Sr.), he succeeded in expanding its publishing and delivery operations and developing its print shop into a prosperous midsize organisation.

Ernst and Fritz Klett also managed to guide the company through the extreme inflation that followed the First World War in Germany.

1936 - 1944
In 1936, Ernst Klett (Jr.) began working at the company with a primary focus on its publishing business. Klett also turned part of its attention from musicology to fiction and non-fiction. While most of its publishing activities were put on hold during the Second World War, the company's facilities on Rotebühlstraße were largely spared by the conflict.

1945 - 1968
After the end of the war, Klett received a licence to recommence its printing and publishing activities from the American military government in 1945. The company also established its own independent publishing house for textbooks to complement its general publishing house for fiction, non-fiction, and psychoanalysis. Fritz Klett's son Roland then joined the family business in 1953; he would go on to initiate a modernisation effort in its printing operations. The publishing house quickly developed into one of West Germany's largest and most successful publishing houses and began offering textbooks throughout the country.

Thomas Klett, Roland Klett, Michael Klett (left to right), 1977

1969 - 1989
In 1969, Michael Klett – the eldest son of Ernst Klett (Jr.) – became a company partner and a member of its management board. He would go on to direct its publishing house in 1976. Michael's younger brother, Thomas, joined him on the board and as a partner in 1973. Representing the third generation of Klett management, they overcame one of the first crises faced by the company's printing division, as well as a decline in the number of students in Germany. This was what prompted Klett to expand in the 1970s and ‘80s through acquisitions (of the Axel Andersson Akademie, for example, which is now the Hamburger Akademie für Fernstudien), holdings (in the Friedrich Verlag and Esslinger Verlag publishing houses), and the foundation of new companies (such as PONS). It thus evolved into a corporate group spanning a diverse range of business areas. The publishing partnership Klett-Cotta then began bolstering the group's efforts in fiction in 1977. The Klett Group would eventually give up the traditional core of its business – its print shop – in 1989.

Klett employees pictured at a company party in 1925. Klett is among the first organisations to take an interest in its workforce's social concerns. In 1923, it creates an aid fund to provide pension payments and other assistance to employees in need.

Klett's main facility at Rotebühlstraße 77 (Stuttgart) in the 1930s. Its print shop, which also accounts for most of the company's business at this time, takes up the lion’s share of the building. In fact, only a few rooms are left over for Klett's publishing activities. During their breaks, employees often play football in the courtyard.

Following the Second World War, Klett receives a printing and publishing licence in November 1945. As this glimpse of the Klett print shop's expansive machine room (1951) shows, this enables the company to get back to work and make a number of modernisations in both areas.

During their lunch break, employees of Klett's textbook publishing house observe the building work under way on the company's premises in 1951. Along with Klett’s general publishing house (which focused on fiction, non-fiction, and psychoanalysis), it is primarily the company's newly established textbook department that continues to draw attention away from its printing activities throughout the 1950s.

Klett's publishing house and print shop continue to grow. As the Klett print shop relocates to the outskirts of Stuttgart in Korb, construction begins on a new facility for its publishing house staff. Klett's new headquarters on Rotebühlstraße (near the waters of Stuttgart's Feuersee) are completed in 1954. The building can still be found there today.

After seeing its publishing house overtake its print shop in terms of its importance during the 1970s, Klett bids farewell to a traditional core of its business in 1989. The primers, storybooks, and German and foreign-language textbooks produced by the publishing house remain popular among collectors.

1990 - 1999
In 1990, Ernst Klett Verlag Leipzig became the first branch of a West German publishing house to begin operating in the former East Germany. The transformation of Ernst Klett GmbH & Co. KG (which had been established in 1992) into a publicly traded company in 1995 then ushered in an effort to restructure its business areas and acquire stakes in additional organisations. The 1990s also saw the Klett Group increase its activities outside of Germany, including in Switzerland, Austria, Spain, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, the former Yugoslavia, and France. In addition, it founded the company Deutsche Weiterbildungsgesellschaft (DWG) as a framework for building and expanding its distance-learning schools and universities.

2000 - today
The first decade of the 21st century was marked by considerable growth. The foundation of the Hamburg distance-learning university Europäische Fernhochschule (2001) and the healthcare-focused Apollon Hochschule der Gesundheitswirtschaft (2005) represented milestones in Klett's targeted effort to build its business in adult and continuing education. The group's distance-learning schools and universities along with its attendance-based universities have made it the leading private provider of continuing education in the German-speaking market. For 10 years now, attendance-based learning facilities ranging from crèches to secondary schools have also been rounding out the Klett Group's services and furthering its evolution into a diversified education company.