Interior of a brightly lit shoe store featuring rieker and Tamaris brands.

Schedule your workforce in 30 minutes, not 3 hours.

How Förstemann manages staffing and branch controlling across 18 Rieker mono-brand stores with SEAK — using the Team Performance Monitor to benchmark comparable locations.

Förstemann at a Glance

The Förstemann family — a household name in footwear retail — operates 18 mono-brand Rieker stores from their base in Ahnatal, near Kassel. The business is led by Kerstin and Jürgen Förstemann, alongside their son Daniel and daughter Nina, with Jonas Roth serving as Head of Controlling — the only non-family member on the leadership team.

Team

around 115 employees

Locations

Hesse, Lower Saxony, North Rhine-Westphalia, Hamburg, and Schleswig-Holstein

SEAK customer since 2016

Workforce Scheduling and Team Performance Monitor (T.P.M.)

Numbers, Data, Facts

Duration of monthly shift planning (down from 180 minutes)

Rieker Single-Brand Stores Across Five Federal States

Employees Scheduled with SEAK

drives Förstemann workforce planning with SEAK

The Challenge

Before 2016, Förstemann managed workforce scheduling with Excel. With 18 mono-brand stores across five federal states and ambitious expansion plans, this approach had become unmanageable. There was no central data repository for master data, real-time target/actual comparisons were impossible, and reporting was consistently delayed.

Four specific pain points were holding the business back:

Excel as a Planning Tool

Workforce scheduling via spreadsheets — manageable, but time-consuming and impossible to scale.

No single source of truth

Master data was scattered across multiple Excel files — no single source of truth, no easy access.

Planned vs. actual comparisons were missing

Planned and actual deployment times couldn't be compared in a timely manner.

Reports With Delay

All reporting was manual and delayed — making it impossible to steer the business effectively.

Shoe store interior with 'FASHION-SHOES' sign and overlaid text introducing Daniel Förstemann.

Daniel Förstemann – Next-Generation Owner – Förstemann Footwear

"Above all, we wanted to go paperless with our scheduling and move to a system that would make the process noticeably easier and faster compared to managing everything in Excel spreadsheets."

The Decision: Three-Hour Opening Presentation at a Trade Show

Förstemann first encountered SEAK at a trade show in 2016. The initial presentation ran for a full three hours — and compared to other vendors, what SEAK demonstrated was "something genuinely new." A follow-up visit from a SEAK team member sealed the deal, with an in-depth look at the analytics tool leaving a lasting impression. What began as an intensive first contact grew into a lasting partnership.

The Execution: Three Planning Modes and the Team Performance Monitor

Förstemann takes a differentiated approach to workforce scheduling responsibility: five stores are planned by a regional manager, eight others in close coordination with store managers, and the remaining locations are managed directly from head office. The central data foundation resides in the SEAK system — including scheduled days and hours per employee, historical data per location, and data for selected dates.

A second cornerstone of Förstemann's SEAK implementation is the Team Performance Monitor (T.P.M.). Using this tool, Förstemann benchmarks stores against similarly structured locations, surfacing significant performance discrepancies — by employee, by location, or by time period.

What the software actually covers

Central Master Data Repository

All master data managed in one place – clean, structured, and organized, instead of scattered across spreadsheets.

Real-Time Budget vs. Actual Comparisons

Compare planned versus actual working hours — at the click of a button.

Availability Overview

See at a glance who's available and who's not — effortless data management.

Past Data by Location

Per-location revenue on selected days — a reliable reference point for smarter shift planning.

Three Planning Modes

Regional managers, branch managers, and central planners — clearly defined responsibilities, all in one platform.

Team Performance Monitor

Benchmark similarly structured locations against each other — comparing productivity, average transaction value, and product category performance by employee, location, or time period.

Objective Data Foundation for Conversations

Employee conversations about workload fairness are now grounded in data, not personal perception.

Phone Support with Server Access

Data is stored on SEAK servers — support can access it directly whenever needed.

Daniel Förstemann – Next-Generation Owner – Förstemann Footwear

"Scheduling an entire month's shifts now takes just 30 to 60 minutes instead of two to three hours. What matters most is that our service quality has improved — because we're now deploying more staff during peak hours than we ever did before."

The Result: What Has Changed Since Then

Planned More Efficiently, Managed More Objectively, Resilient Through Structural Change

Efficiency

Productivity Gains

Schedule your team in 30–60 minutes instead of 2–3 hours — every month.

Service quality up — more staff on the floor when it matters most.

React faster to short-term changes at your locations.

Controls & Analytics

Control with Team Performance Monitor

Spot striking differences between similarly structured locations.

Productivity, average transaction value, and category metrics — broken down by employee, location, or time period.

Actionable insights at your fingertips – such as targeted retraining for individual employees.

Employees and Customers

Satisfaction Increased

Staff satisfaction improves when schedules align with traffic patterns — peak selling moments and employee availability coincide perfectly.

Performance conversations about workload fairness become easier — backed by data, not gut feeling.

Service quality, average order value, and add-on sales (e.g., accessories) can be systematically improved.

Industry Context

Stabilization Through Structural Change

In the face of structural shifts in the footwear industry, revenues have been maintained — and in many cases grown.

Employee productivity has increased – driven in part by smarter workforce scheduling.

Daniel Förstemann – Junior Owner – Förstemann Footwear

"The best part is the clarity it provides. Branches at similarly structured locations with notable differences in performance metrics can be identified effortlessly. This support empowers store management to take precisely the right action at exactly the right time."

Which building blocks Förstemann relies on

Workforce Scheduling

One centralized data foundation, budget-vs-actual comparisons, and three planning modes (Regional, Branch, Central) — deployed across 18+ stores in five states.

Team Performance Monitor

Benchmark similarly structured locations, track KPIs per employee, site, and time period — and use the insights to drive targeted actions such as refresher training.

Daniel Förstemann – Next-Generation Owner – Förstemann Footwear

"The phone support is excellent. Every issue has been resolved extremely quickly. The SEAK team truly knows what they're talking about and understands the realities of retail. Whenever something gets stuck, they find a solution you'd never have thought of yourself."

Let's talk about whether SEAK is the right fit for your business

In a 30-minute introductory call, we'll assess where your business stands today, identify which modules are the right priority for your situation, and outline a realistic implementation roadmap.

Alternatively, you're welcome to reach out via our contact form — we'll get back to you promptly. Or give us a call at: +49 40 238 348 – 000

The Trade Trusts SEAK

From fashion and food retail to building materials and specialist trade: retailers across Germany rely on SEAK to manage their workforce.

Footwear Retail as a Family Legacy

The Förstemann family — known in the industry as a "shoe family" — is headquartered in Ahnatal, near Kassel, and operates 18 single-brand Rieker stores. Their locations span prime shopping centers and high-footfall retail destinations across Hesse, Lower Saxony, North Rhine-Westphalia, Hamburg, and Schleswig-Holstein.

The management team is led by Kerstin and Jürgen Förstemann, alongside their son Daniel and daughter Nina. The only non-family member on the leadership team is Jonas Roth, who heads the Controlling division. With around 115 employees and ambitious expansion plans, Förstemann has partnered with SEAK since 2016 — finding in them the IT partner that seamlessly unifies workforce scheduling and store-level controlling in one solution.