Infrastructure in the countryside

The end of Lagerhaus: towns struggle to find a successor

History at the end of the year: the warehouse in Zederhaus(Bild: Holitzky Roland)

A painful loss in Zederhaus and St. Koloman: both Lagerhaus locations are closing. The residents want a new local supplier. Talks are still ongoing.

With the closure of the warehouse, the municipality of Zederhaus will lose an important supplier of building materials, tools, feed and food at the end of the year. The adjacent petrol station will also be missing. There will be a replacement in the building owned by the Raiffeisen Association. "We are currently determining exactly what we want in Zederhaus," says Mayor Thomas Kößler (ÖVP). They want to prevent "a downward spiral" from beginning. Matthias Bliem, the last grocer in the village: "It's bad when suppliers disappear."

The situation is similar in St. Koloman
According to "Raiffeisen Lagerhaus GmbH", both locations were no longer economically viable. According to Managing Director Martin Schiller, pending investments in the petrol stations in particular made their continued existence unrealistic. He points out that there are other warehouses in the surrounding area.

In St. Koloman, the building belongs to the municipality. Without a warehouse, the village of 1,800 inhabitants will have no local supply at the end of September. A questionnaire on the sensitive issue has just been sent out to the residents. Talks about a successor are underway. However, grocery chains are often only interested in a store with a population of 5000 or more, according to the head of the village, Herbert Walkner (ÖVP).