About autohaus

autohaus

AUTOHAUS is the twice-monthly trade magazine for entrepreneurs and executives of car dealerships, published in Munich by the Tecvia GmbH (formerly Springer Fachmedien München) under its Auto Business Media brand. Founded on 8 January 1957 and now in its 70th volume, it is the information medium for the operators of modern automobile businesses: the dealers, the repair shops, the parts, accessories and tire traders. Its program covers the entire automotive economy in practical form — from trade fairs, fleet management and used-car exchanges to banks and financing, logistics, workshop systems, engines and transmissions. The brand extends into the autohaus.de online portal, the ePaper, the news app, newsletters, books, the AUTOHAUS Akademie, AUTOHAUS next, the AUTOHAUS Panel, the podcast ("Wer uns hört, führt" — who listens to us, leads) and social media. In 2010 the magazine won the German trade press prize as "Fachmedium des Jahres" (trade medium of the year). For the German car trade, AUTOHAUS is the institution: the magazine the industry's decision-makers have read for nearly seven decades.

Overview

The German car dealership is a business under permanent transformation: the agency-model debates, the electrification's service implications, the direct-sales experiments, the consolidation of dealer groups, the used-car market's digitalization, and the aftersales business that carries the margins. AUTOHAUS addresses this world with a twice-monthly program whose promise is the "Rundum-Sorglos-Paket" — the all-around carefree package of great topic diversity and high target-group relevance for the automotive trade. The readers are the business owners, the operations managers, and increasingly the damage-business, car-insurance and automotive-industry segments the brand serves.

The editorial mix follows the dealership's agenda. The management coverage addresses the entrepreneurial questions: business strategy, succession, the dealer-group consolidation, the manufacturer-dealer relations, and the digitalization — from the AI-supported sales processes to the digital transport management. The GWtrends special section bundles the information for the successful used-car business, professionalizing the dealers' used-vehicle operations. The market coverage tracks the industry's developments: the trade fairs, the fleet and fleet-management business, the used-car exchanges, the banks and financing, and the logistics topics. The technical coverage addresses the workshop side: engines, transmissions, workshop systems, workwear, and the aftersales business. The special issues treat specialist topics in depth, and the Auto Business Shop's forms and books program serves the dealership's administrative needs.

History

AUTOHAUS was founded on 8 January 1957 — in the decade of the German economic miracle, when motorization transformed the country and the car dealership became a pillar of the retail economy. The magazine grew with the trade: through the 1960s and 1970s dealership expansion, the 1980s professionalization, the 1990s reunification boom and the consolidation waves, the 2000s internet disruption of car retail, and the 2010s and 2020s electrification and digitalization. The publishing history reflects the automotive B2B press's consolidation: from the Springer Fachmedien München era to today's Tecvia GmbH (the renamed successor) and its Auto Business Media brand, from the Aschauer Straße 30 Munich address.

The editorial leadership gave the title its continuity: Prof. Hannes Brachat as publisher (Herausgeber), Ralph M. Meunzel as editor-in-chief, Frank Selzle as managing editor (Chef vom Dienst). The 2010 "Fachmedium des Jahres" prize from the Deutsche Fachpresse recognized the magazine's standing. The brand's extensions built the cross-media platform: the autohaus.de portal, the news app, the newsletters, the academy, the panel research, the podcast, and the events — the motorcycle tours, the Autohaus Classic Rallye, the Future Leaders Day (with mobile.de, bringing the next generation of the car trade together), and the IT Net.Work (the 2026 edition in Frankfurt's Klassikstadt, on digitalization, AI and process optimization in the dealership). The 2026 volume marks the 70th year — nearly seven decades as the car trade's magazine.

Coverage and Content

Each of the 19 annual issues follows the automotive trade's calendar. The management and strategy coverage addresses the dealership's entrepreneurial questions: the business models (from the traditional dealership to the agency models), the manufacturer relations, the consolidation strategies, the succession planning, and the next-generation leadership (the Future Leaders Day's themes — the customer journey, the AI-supported sales and service processes). The used-car coverage — the GWtrends section — treats the profession's growth business: the sourcing, the pricing, the remarketing, and the digital exchanges.

The market and industry coverage tracks the automotive economy: the trade fairs, the fleet business, the financing and banking topics, the logistics, and the damage-business and car-insurance segments (SchadenBusiness, Kfz-Assekuranz) the brand increasingly serves. The technology and workshop coverage addresses the aftersales side: the workshop systems, the engines and transmissions, the workwear, and the service processes — including the IT Net.Work's digitalization, AI and automation topics. The special issues provide the deep treatment of specialist themes, and the interviews and event coverage — the Classic Rallye, the motorcycle tours, the Future Leaders Day galleries — document the trade's community life. The podcast "Wer uns hört, führt" adds the audio dimension: the dealership leadership conversation in listening form.

Organization and Ownership

AUTOHAUS is published by the Tecvia GmbH of Munich (Aschauer Straße 30, 81549 München) — formerly Springer Fachmedien München GmbH — within its Auto Business Media brand, the automotive B2B publishing division. Prof. Hannes Brachat serves as publisher (Herausgeber); Ralph M. Meunzel is editor-in-chief; Frank Selzle is managing editor. The editorial team combines automotive journalists with the trade's practitioners and experts as contributors — the combination that gives the magazine both the journalistic authority and the practical proximity the dealership audience expects. The AUTOHAUS Panel provides the market-research arm: the reader-structure analyses (the INTERROGARE studies) documenting the magazine's reach and satisfaction.

Commercially, AUTOHAUS follows the B2B automotive-press model: the magazine's subscriptions (the 19 annual issues), advertising from the car manufacturers, the importers, the parts and accessories suppliers, the workshop-equipment vendors, the IT and software providers, the banks and leasing companies, and the used-car exchanges whose customers are the dealerships, plus the academy, events and panel revenues. The reader-structure data — the high recommendation rates, the satisfaction scores — documents the audience quality: the business owners and executives who decide the dealerships' purchases. The ISSN 0171-9807 identifies the title in the journal databases, where its 70-volume run represents one of the longest continuous publishing histories in the automotive trade press.

Digital Presence

The brand's digital home is autohaus.de, the online portal carrying the daily automotive-trade news flow, the issue presentations, the ePaper editions, and the mediathek — the event galleries from the Future Leaders Day to the IT Net.Work 2026, documenting the trade's gatherings. The portal's news sections deliver the continuous coverage the automotive market's pace demands: the manufacturer and dealer news, the market data, and the regulatory updates between the twice-monthly issues. The news app brings the coverage to the smartphone.

The newsletters deliver the news selection to the trade's inboxes, and the social channels serve the community engagement. The AUTOHAUS Akademie operates the education arm, AUTOHAUS next the innovation formats, and the AUTOHAUS Panel the research. The podcast "Wer uns hört, führt" extends the brand into audio. After nearly seven decades — from the 1957 founding through the Springer era to the Tecvia present — AUTOHAUS operates as the car trade's cross-media platform: the magazine for the curated management reading, the portal and app for the news flow, the academy for the education, the panel for the market data, and the events for the physical gathering — the information medium for the entrepreneurs and executives of the automobile business, in print, online and in person.