Founded in Germany under the name Otto Versand in 1949, Otto Group today is a worldwide-operating trading and services corporation with more than 55,000 employees on three continents. In its core business segment, the mail-order distribution, the Otto Group has been by far the world market leader for many years. To an increasing degree, Otto's classic catalogue business is supplemented with e-commerce. The Otto Group is the world's second-largest online seller in the B2C segment, following Amazon's lead. The third component of the Multichannel Retail concept of the Otto Group is over-the-counter retail trade.

The company's founder, Werner Otto, started his business as a mail-order shoe company in 1949. Soon after, trade in textiles and later on hardware followed. During the so-called German "economic miracle" period, the company grew rapidly. At the beginning of the 1970s, investments in other companies, new establishments, and joint ventures turned the company into a large group of affiliated companies.

In 1974, Otto took a stake in the 3 Suisses-Group, which is not only active in the trade and services sectors on its home turf France, but in many other European countries. In the same year, Otto also took a share in Heine. Since 1981, the company has been fully integrated in the Group and is extended into the Heine-Group. Heine Group not only includes the Heine mail-order business, but – by investments in companies and takeovers in 80th and 90th – also Alba Moda, Frankonia, Sport-Scheck, the joint venture companies Castro Germany and Eddie Bauer Germany as well as the Swiss mail-order house Jelmoli.

In 1976, Otto bought the majority of the shares in the Schwab Versand. Today, the Schwab-Group not only comprises the Schwab Versand but the Witt Weiden company, Germany's oldest textile mail-order house with branches in Switzerland and France as well as the Group's member companies in the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Hungary.

In 1981 Dr. Michael Otto took over as Chairman of the Executive Board and

Chief Executive Officer. Under his leadership Otto Group evolved into the largest mail-order group in the world. In 1986 the group was actively expanded into Asia for the first time. As a joint venture with the Japanese Sumitomo Corporation, the mail-order business OTTO Sumisho was established in Tokyo. Today, the OTTO Sumisho Group also comprises the joint venture Eddie Bauer Japan. In 1986, Otto founded the trading company Bon Prix in Germany, which today also has branches in Italy, France, Poland and Switzerland

In 1997, in addition to its business activities in Asia, the Otto Group expanded into Korea: First, the joint venture OTTO Doosan was established. Also in 1997, Otto took a share in the German Baur Versand, which, in 2001, was also expanded into a group by acquiring shares in the Austrian Universal Versand.

Since 1998, the Otto Group has held a majority of shares in the American stationary and mail-order retailer Crate and Barrel, which is one of the leading suppliers of international household goods in the United States.

Otto's international presence provides an excellent basis for the transfer of know-how and the use of synergy capabilities. Thus, those segments that are crucial to a mail-order business, such as purchase, marketing, distribution, electronic data processing, and logistics, can be networked globally. At the same time, a high degree of independence of national companies guarantees flexibility and customer proximity as well as the optimal target-group appeal in each country.

As a future-oriented company, the Otto Group focused early on multi-channel distribution and has increasingly supplemented its classic mail-order business with e-commerce and stationary retailers.

Since the mid-1990s, the Group's mail-order companies have been offering their products on Internet portals. Especially the flagship company, www.otto.de, has been prospering and will be developed to become a complete one-stop shopping destination. As a result customers will profit from a greatly increased range of products, with even more on offer in every category. The group’s portfolio also includes on-line only companies, such as www.myToys.de or the shopping mall www.shopping24.de, used these days by more than 40 companies to offer their goods. The goods on offer cover a wide range from fashion and technology to books and travel.

Furthermore, in 2006 Otto and Cdiscount, the E-commerce subsidiary of the Casino Group, one of France’s leading retail groups, agreed on a strategic partner to expand www.discount24.de, a full Otto subsidiary operating the E-commerce website “discount24.de”.

By developing strategic alliances with leading suppliers in other industries, the Group continues to expand its e-commerce capabilities and relies on the transfer of know-how. A good example for this is the joint venture www.obiatotto.de, which has combined the industry expertise of Germany's leading DIY market with the Otto Group's competence in distance selling and logistics since 2000.

The growing area of stationary retailers within the Otto-Group is, for example, represented by Zara Deutschland, a joint venture with the Spanish Inditex-Group, Castro Deutschland, a joint venture with Castro Isreal, the SportScheck branches, and the stationary retailers of the joint-venture company Eddie Bauer Germany as well as more than 1000 Otto Shops in good location.

With the credit company Cofidis and the direct bank Covefi of the 3 Suisses Group as well as EOS Group Otto is also active in the financial services industry all over Europe. Also Hanseatic Bank founded in 1969 is part of the segment financial services of the Otto Group. Hanseatic Bank focuses on personal loans and deposits and handles i.a. credit buying and installment purchases of Otto customers. In November 2004, the Group announced the sale of a 75 percent share in Hanseatic Bank to Société Générale. This long-term cooperative arrangement enables the Otto Group to offer to the mail-order business clients of OTTO and Schwab a wider range of financial services and products and makes it possible for the Hanseatic Bank to grow beyond its existing options in the consumer lending business.

The travel service provider OTTO Freizeit und Touristik GmbH (OFT) focuses on Otto's activities in the growth markets for leisure and travel. It comprises i.a. the OTTO Reisen company, the travel agency chains Reiseland and Holiday Express, Travel Overland Flugreisen, as well as the Internet portal www.travelchannel.de.

Having founded its subsidiary Hermes in 1972, Otto is one of the pioneers in the logistics field. The Hermes Logistics Group is now the second-largest delivery service, with a 30 percent market share in the B2C business. It also offers its services to third parties, such as the Deutsche Bahn AG [Germany's main railway company] or eBay. With vigorous growth Hermes is also involved in C2C business.

Customer and service orientation of the Otto Group as well as its consistent use of innovation and synergy capabilities play crucial roles in its success story.

For customers, the big advantage of distance selling is its convenience and the local availability of goods and services. In order to enhance these two factors by offering additional services, Otto, at an early stage, established a round-the-clock telephone customer service, which operates 365 days a year; customer service representatives are available for consultation and orders. As one of the first companies to offer orders by e-mail or via its online shop at www.otto.de, Otto is also an online-trading pioneer of the Internet industry. Today, OTTO customers can also order the whole product line via WAP on their mobile phones and since recently directly via TV’s remote control. Therefore – sole requirement: Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition.

Otto's Hermes Logistics Group offers a flexible delivery service, which includes 24-hour and after-hours service, delivery on the customer's desired date, several delivery attempts, and free pick-up of returns. Hermes delivers and assembles labeled furniture, hooks up large electrical equipment, and picks up or repairs old equipment.

Apart from offering a strong product line as well as comprehensive services, Otto started early to incorporate environmental and social consciousness in its company policy.

All locations of the individual company OTTO in Germany have an effective control system for environmental protection. The company ranks among the largest processors of bio cotton worldwide. As a globally operating trading company, Otto is committed to an ethical and responsible business management. It is part of the corporate strategy. It is the company's objective to observe both ecological and social standards when importing goods. In order to meet the challenge of a global economy, on Otto's initiative, the company itself and other member companies of the Außenhandelsvereinigung des deutschen Einzelhandels [AVE – the foreign trade association of the German retail trade] have joined forces to guarantee their suppliers' compliance with social standards.

To monitoring social standards, the Otto Group is also participating in the Business Social Compliance Initiative (BSCI), an initiative formed under the umbrella of the European Foreign Trade Association (FTA). With the objective to strengthen the role of the sustainable economic development as a factor in the supply-and-demand equation and thus a factor of co-determination in the entire market development. Under the leadership of Dr. Michael Otto, the company, committed to a sustainable economic strategy, has always played a pioneering role and has received a vast number of accolades for this commitment.