Take a look inside “Disney World for music” as we go behind the scenes at Thomann’s incredible HQ
What would a “Disney World for music” even look like? Look no further than Thomann’s headquarters in Treppendorf, Germany.
A musical Mecca located in a tiny village of only a couple hundred people, Thomann HQ has a store with just about every music item you could dream of, and Europe’s largest warehouse, boasting one million cubic metres in volume on 120,000 square metres of floor space.
READ MORE: How Thomann and Harley Benton provide a 360-degree user experience
2024 marks Thomann’s 70th anniversary, so the team here at Guitar.com took a trip to Treppendorf to go behind the scenes of the company’s monumental operation – which sees over 100,000 items shipped every day – and to learn more about the family-focused ethos of CEO Hans Thomann that has turned Treppendorf into a theme park for music lovers.
“My grandparents and my parents had a small farm,” Hans recalls about the foundations of the company of which he’s now at the helm. “In 1968 we had the first real brick-and-mortar store.” He says the goals for the company in its early days were to have the “best prices” and “great products” customers were looking for.
The real eye candy comes when Florian Rittweger, Thomann’s Director of Sales, takes us on a tour of the store’s guitar department. It’s a guitarist’s dream, indeed, with hundreds of guitars from the likes of Fender, Gibson, Ibanez, and, of course, Thomann’s own budget brand Harley Benton.
But while the Thomann store is nothing short of sprawling as it is, Hans Thomann never takes his eyes off expansion where possible; as Rittweger explains, the guitar dept. currently has around 80 classical guitars, but in the future will house over 600.
It’s clear from our visit that Thomann’s customer-centric ethos permeates into every sector of the operation. “We’re usually the first point of contact for the customers,” says Customer Service Representative Gabriel Smith. “Making that first impression is a huge responsibility, because if it goes badly, you’re not going to want to deal with the company again.”
And while the store is impressive enough, when Hans took us on a tour of the company’s gigantic warehouse, the sheer scope of its operation became apparent. “We have about 30 kilometres of conveyors,” he says. “We have, on average, between 170 and 190 million Euros [worth] of stock.”
A significant portion of Thomann’s marketing effort comes from many YouTube channels, which showcase gear in a fun and informative way. “It’s easy to think, ‘The warehouses, the systems in the warehouses, it’s all massive. It’s very Amazon-like,’” says YouTube channel manager Guillaume Chenin. “I think social media has been a big part – YouTube, among others – to put faces on the company and show people that we are people.”
Watch the highlights of our trip to Thomann HQ in the video above. Head to Thomann for basically any item of musical gear you could ever desire.
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