VfL Wolfsburg

VfL Wolfsburg

VfL Wolfsburg has been for quite some time now more than just a professional sport club. As a sports club with a long tradition, around 20,000 members and an even bigger fan club, VfL Wolfsburg is fully aware of its social responsibility. The club plays a large role in society. The image that the club portrays is constructed not only by goals and points, wins and losses, but by the actions of the club off the field. Football is more than just 90 minutes on the pitch. Commitment to our community is one of the features that characterizes today’s world. We aim to live more consciously and consciously participate in society and its development. Activities in the social and environmental fields have therefore become increasingly important.

„Give and Go“ with the Community
As a Bundesliga club and an important part of the city of Wolfsburg, VfL Wolfsburg bears a special type of responsibility for its region. This has involved much more than just sport for a long time now, and includes activities covering social and environmental aspects. The club sees itself as a role model and hopes that its social commitment will motivate others to think about this aspect and, most important, to also join in. This is driven by the motivation to give back to the people in the city and the region a part of the huge support that VfL Wolfsburg has enjoyed since it was founded in 1945.

This mutual give and take is the inner strength of the club. Although initially concentrated on the region around Wolfsburg, VfL Wolfsburg has expanded these activities in the meantime to cover the whole of Germany. And with its Wolfsburg United initiative, the club joins Unicef in a co-operation project to become active worldwide for the first time.

VfL Wolfsburg’s CSR activities are focused on three principles: effectiveness, sustainability and honesty. The club’s objective is to integrate within everyday life the values it brings alive through its sporting activities. The club is particularly committed to four special aspects: education, integration, health and environment. The “Kick-off VfL” project pursues a long-term strategy and is part of the ‘Moving Together’ initiative. “Kick-off VfL” has been pursued actively by VfL Wolfsburg since 2006 with the aim of inspiring children and young people to adopt a balanced lifestyle with exercise and healthy nutrition. Over the years, the project network has been joined by 100 clubs and 100 schools, as well as 25 kindergartens from the Niedersachsen and Sachsen-Anhalt regions – and they all maintain close relations with the club.

Moving Together
The CSR Team designs most of their projects under the theme of “working/moving together“ in order to continually promote this cooperation. “With this initiative, we also want signify that we are not only concerned with football,” says CEO Thomas Röttgermann. Instead of only financially supporting projects on request, the CSR team pursues a strategic approach that has filtered out key issues and focuses its activities on self-developed, networked and long term scheduled projects aimed at social change.

Education – using football to inspire children and youth to learn
Integration – inclusion of people with disabilities and the fight against racism
Health– convey joy of movement and generate enthusiasm for a more active life
Environment – effective environmental management and awareness of climate protection