Industry on the ground

Involuntary “summer break” at Hartl Haus is coming

There will be an involuntary "summer break" at Hartl Haus. The long-established company is hoping that this will improve capacity utilization.(Bild: Hartl Haus)

The order situation is putting the Waldviertel-based prefabricated house manufacturer in a tight spot. The company is fighting for every employee - they are being sent on "stamping" for four weeks at a time, spread over several months, in order to achieve economic capacity utilization. "This means that customers and interested parties will not feel the effects of this measure," says Hartl Haus.

"We are doing everything we can to retain as many employees as possible. In March, the construction and ancillary construction industry in Austria had over 50,000 unemployed people," emphasizes Yves Suter, head of the Waldviertel-based prefabricated house manufacturer Hartl Haus. There, employees are given four weeks' notice over the summer months and given a promise of re-employment. Due to the time delay, customers will not be affected by the measures, the long-established company assures.

In the production areas, prefabricated house assembly and individual positions in the white-collar sector are affected, Hartl Haus specified on Thursday. The furniture joinery is exempt from this, as the order situation there is excellent and full capacity utilization prevails.

Optimistic outlook for the future
With further measures, such as vacation reductions and redistributions, Suter wants to achieve more capacity utilization in the family business from Echsenbach, which has around 300 employees. Interest in home ownership is on the rise again and the company is cautiously optimistic about the future. According to Suter, the main reason for caution is that there are still many unanswered questions regarding the government's so-called housing package.

With these measures in place, full capacity utilization is expected for the rest of the year. "Our production and assembly lists are therefore full until the end of the year," says the prefabricated house manufacturer. 

"Secret" early warning system?
Strange: The AMS early warning system was of course triggered by the high number of redundancies. However, the company is not allowed to name the number of employees, nor confirm or deny that the early warning system was triggered at all.