Offenbach: Successful mentoring | Offenbach

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The Gatzweiler / Su tandem took part in the mentoring program in Offenbach. The engineer helped the café owner to focus fully on her company.

Marc Gatzweiler was a bit overwhelmed at the beginning, he admits. When the 50-year-old spoke to Swana Su for the first time, he was faced with a young woman who was overflowing with creativity and ideas. “I need your main business case. We push aside the things that have nothing to do with it, ”recalls the graduate engineer of the first conversation around a year ago.

“We focused 1000 percent on the company,” adds Su. The 25-year-old opened the Swana-Café on Bleichstrasse in Offenbach a year ago. Corona came three weeks later. She had tried to set up a terrace with the city of Offenbach. Because of the parking situation in the street not far from Wilhelmsplatz, however, there was nothing to be done. “But they told me: Hey, we have something else for you,” says the 25-year-old. Namely the mentoring program of the founding city of Offenbach, which is organized by KIZ.

Su was persuaded to take part as a mentee and was assigned Gatzweiler as a mentor. “It was a good fit right from the start,” says Gatzweiler, who runs the Delta Elements building materials business in Offenbach and has six employees. He was ready to take the time to support a young start-up in the initial phase. “At first he was my emotional support,” says Su. “Everything went wrong.” After the first lockdown, there were a couple of good months, then the second lockdown came straight away. A nightmare for the committed young entrepreneur.

She opened the café for her mother. “It was my dream to give something back to my mom,” says Su, who until then had worked in the marketing and sales of jewelry and watches. However, she wanted to put family first. She actually wanted to move from Bad Salzhausen to Frankfurt, then she discovered the new building on Offenbacher Bleichstrasse, where she bought the apartment and the associated shop. “She is very grown up at a young age,” says Gatzweiler. You don’t even need a lot of advice, you have clear ideas. “We didn’t have a jour fixe, but did it as needed,” reports Gatzweiler. In addition to showing areas of development, he made it clear to her from the start that she had to deal with the numbers. “That’s exactly what I wanted to learn from him,” confirms Su.

She has a clear concept for her café. The Arabica coffee beans come from Ethiopia and Brazil and are roasted blond in the Hoppenworth & Ploch roastery in Frankfurt. There are vegan, sugar-free cakes, among other things, and her mother makes Chinese dumplings or other snacks. However, she is currently on vacation and a trainee is taking care of the business. During the lockdowns she let her creativity run free and painted a giant peacock on one wall, on the other wall are red lotus blossoms – her mother’s favorite animal and flower.

“I’ve learned a lot more this year than I have probably learned in five years,” says Su. Gatzweiler also believes that the Corona crisis was a good touchstone, especially since his mentee mastered it well. “I was also very much inspired by your personality,” says Gatzweiler. The human level is also important in dealing with customers in the otherwise harsh construction industry.

Swana Su wants to finally get started with her café after the end of the federal emergency brake. And Marc Gatzweiler will certainly stop by for a coffee or a piece of cake more often. “We have become good friends, like family,” says Su with a beaming smile.

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