Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof insolvent – ​​are department stores still relevant?

At least three times a week, a DHL messenger rings my bell to deliver packages of goods that my hip neighbors have ordered online from somewhere. When I'm at the post office, the same neighbors stand in line because they return the stuff they ordered. Doesn't fit, don't like.

How much time, postage and courier fuel they could have saved if they had gone to a department store instead of the internet! There they could have compared and tried on everything possible, would only have bought what fits, liked and lasts longer, they would have protected the environment, secured jobs for saleswomen and revived the city centre.

You would have found everything under one roof: women's blouses, pressure cookers, Dior perfume, even a broken lamp repair service. They would have moved, met real people, had fun shopping. In short: Department stores are an enrichment for everyone and make people happy, Amazon

Unfortunately, the author won't be able to accept parcels next Saturday because he prefers to stroll through KaDeWe.

Looting the candy department at Karstadt alone one night, that was my greatest childhood dream. With the looming bankruptcy of the group, the dream is probably over. I don't think that's bad. I try to imagine a more desolate place than a department store.

I last entered one last summer. I wanted to have my bedside lamp repaired and read about a repair café in the Karstadt on Hermannplatz in Berlin. There I found a master repairman, squatting between old electronic devices.

His gaze was as sad as the whole building around him. He didn't want to stay here, he told me. Here, on the third floor of a department store, without windows, without customers, with stuffy air and bright light - who doesn't want to flee? To keep such a place alive, possibly with government help, would be madness. It's time to make room for something new. For example for art exhibitions or adventure playgrounds - preferably with a sweets section.

The author prefers to buy sweets in the liquorice shop around the corner.