Open Day
at DG on 23rd Febr. 2002, Febr. 14th, 2004 and Febr. 18th, 2006
and the DG Safety Training at Febr. 19th, 2005
Who would have thought this would be such a success?
When the idea of organizing an open day first emerged last year in November, I was not the only one to be skeptical about it: "Just imagine we do an open day and nobody turns up!"
The initial response was slow, so at the end of December we expected 100 to 150 visitors - well, that wasn't too bad...
- But in the following weeks there were more and more confirmations, and even just plain emails saying "the XY club will attend on 23rd Feb with 40 people." Coach operators even phoned us to ask for directions. One day before the event we had 530 confirmations!
The final assembly hall was tidied up and prepared for the big day. All other halls were also tidied up and swept clean (a good opportunity to get this done once in a while!) and access areas and paths for visitors defined by cordoning off restricted areas with tape barriers. The offices and the hangar were also open for visitors.
So what exciting things happened on that day - or rather - what did YOU miss?
- At the entrance the visitors were treated to a glass of champagne, served by the DG wives and partners.
- You then had the opportunity to have a wander round the production areas, where our employees were available to explain the construction of a glider on-site. This was a nice experience for our people as well - the fact that their work obviously is of great interest to and highly valued by visitors. If you work on the gliders every day you tend to forget how visitors will see it.
- In the big hall our gliders were rigged and available for people to assess the cockpit layout and comfort. Soon glider pilots from all over the place were busy chatting to each other.
- We had an information stand where we handed out brochures and CDs - which at 200 copies were far from sufficient!
- The flight simulator with a big video screen was used particularly by our future customers, the slightly older children, who flew rolls and loops with a Boeing 777 - poor passengers...
- The slightly younger future customers enjoyed playing in our bouncy castle which had been lent to us by a famous North American restaurant chain.
- One definite highlight was the demonstration of our rescue system Noah, with which one volunteer got thrown out of the glider four times, attracting a big audience. This impressed a lot of visitors!
- And to make sure our visitors wouldn't starve we offered soup, sausages and coffee, plus home-made cakes baked by our employees.
Although nobody actually counted the number of visitors we reckon that we had about 700 people in the factory, and I would like to think that those 700 were 700 happy and content visitors.
A lot of people approached me, my wife or our employees and told us how impressed they were by the new production halls, the friendliness of our staff (without whom we would never have been able to hold such an event) and the products we sell.
And even the weather was on our side: It was so awful that nobody could have been flying anyway, so people came to our factory instead. Unfortunately this also meant that the aerobatic display in the DG-1000 was cancelled.
Well, in all modesty I guess I can say it was a very successful event, and we certainly enjoyed it.
A big thank you to our dedicated staff - they all volunteered to help host the event!
- friedel weber - 
Translation: Claudia Buengen
We invited you again
By overtaking Rolladen-Schneider we have got so many new customers, that we would like to repeat this event once more.
Of course all nice people who are interested in gliding are heartily invited too.
Saturday, February, 14th 2004 - 10.00 a.m.
The Day After
“What is going on here?” This was the most frequent asked question from our customers upon arrival. Not that they were unaware what’s going on at our factory that day, but they were unable to find a parking spot within a mile in the whole industrial park...
They came from almost all of Europe. We had visitors from Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, and even the United Kingdom was represented.
And even though the group of glider pilots from Potsdam didn’t come from a foreign country, they still had a long journey to reach us.
How many came? We don’t know. How could we have counted them? At least the 550 prepared CDs were gone at 4pm. And based on that and the fact that not every guest received or requested a CD, a number of 1000 guests appears to be a fair assumption.
It was great fun for everyone, as we were told frequently.
We repeated the same program as from our first open house (see above), but we had also new things to show, like the LS gliders.
Alwin Guentert delivered again a perfect aerobatics show with the DG-1000S (and “of course” the tug plane had to tow inverted again...
).
Two young pilots flew their indoor flying models around our compressed air lines. It is amazing how technology advanced in this area.
Our employees answered the many questions from our guests regarding details in design and production process. And a particular hot topic was the question regarding our spar bonding process...
The raffle contributed some extra excitement. As a curiosity, the grand price of one week flying with a DG-808S was awarded to a member of my home club in Bielefeld.
No, there was no foul play involved or even possible. The two little “lucky fairies” did the drawing very seriously and were absolutely unbetrayable!
Almost all our employees were present, even though it was their spare time. They were very enthusiastic with the open house project and did a marvelous job in decorating the factory and planning the event details.
The most important effect of the day can hardly be described in detail. It was the pleasure for our guests to meet other pilots and friends in our house; to have interesting conversations; and to receive detailed information directly from the manufacturer’s experts.
And such a harmonic event pleases then everyone, the guests, the employees, and also the boss.
“You will do this again soon, will you?” this was a frequently question. We will think about it – when we have something new to present......
.... there was a little boy, who said to his father: “Daddy, there was a friendly man with a white beard, who explained me everything. And he really knew about everything! I believe that must have been the Janitor!”
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DG Safety Training at Febr. 19th, 2005
In cooperation with the Safety Board of the German Aero Club we offer a Safety Training for you.
The Safety Training will be held at Febr. 19th, 10.00 o´clock in our factory.
We have some interesting talks and a demonstration of the NOAH-System. But the talks will be held in German language.
If you are able to understand sufficient German, please be so kind, to read here.
Public Day 2006
It is almost tradition that every year when there is no "Aero" Exhibition in Friedrichshafen DG Flugzeugbau celebrates "The Day of the Open Door". This year it took place again on February 18th at our plant in Bruchsal.
What can one say it was "as always" a success.
We had about the same number of guests as in 2004, some 1000 or slightly more.
It appeared that this time a large number of pilots attended who asked very specific technical questions and one of them bought a DG-800C on the spot. A very satisfying situation for us.
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For the first time there were also a number of manufacturers of soaring related equipment displaying their goods which ranged from solar cells to instruments, and glider trailers. In addition there were also some artists exhibiting their paintings and jewelry.
These exhibitors were very satisfied to display their wares to an interested clientele in a relaxed atmosphere outside the usual hectic of a large trade show.
A conference under the auspices of the German Aero Club "DAEC AG Human Factors" was taking place at the same time which established the first outline for the "Human factor Questionnaire for General Aviation". This conference was chaired by Juergen Knueppel and he and participants of the meeting came during their breaks to have a beer with us to relax.
Also, the gliding club operating on our airfield used the occasion of our Open House to honor the winners of the DMSt for the Rhein-Neckar-Enz region.
In total it was a successful party enjoyed by all.
International meeting of DG Representatives
In conjunction with the day of the Open Door we invited our representatives from around the world for a get- together. The purpose was to have all the people who represent our company worldwide together in Bruchsal to get to know each other. I personally prophesied that none of the overseas people like from New Zealand, Australia or the USA etc would show up. But I was
totally mistaken, all Europeans came anyway, but also all the overseas ones showed up, except our Japanese colleague, who really had a very good excuse.
All were enthused about our facilities and plant, and the possibility to meet one another and were particularly amazed by the amount of visitors the day of the Open Door attracted.
At the same time it was interesting for the visiting pilots to meet their DG representative personally.
But for our representatives the get- together was specifically worthwhile as through personal contact and discussion they are now able to better understand their individual challenges and problems.
The word "jetlag" was one of the most used words during their stay. For instance, our Spanish colleague Pepe Gresa came directly from a six week soaring holiday in Australia to us for four days.
Only Dick Bradley was happy as Bruchsal is in the same time zone as South Africa.
Translation: Frank Pennauer