After a full day of wandering through Innsbruck and taking the train back to Augsburg, I found myself facing the inevitable task—packing my suitcase for the journey home. There’s always a bittersweet feeling in that moment, knowing that a good trip is coming to an end. Augsburg has left its mark on me and so…
Tag: Max Beecher
A Free Day in Innsbruck
Wednesday night after lots of deliberating with my friends and German students, a few of us on the trip decided to plan our free day to Innsbruck, Austria. We had been told to buy two regional rail passes and we figured that’s all we would need to go from Augsburg to Munich and then Munich…
Presentation Day
Now that the company visits were over, it was time to give final presentations. Harry and I worked on our slides on Tuesday with our free time. My company was GROB and we built most of presentation around what was talked about during the company visits. Building the Ansoff Matrix and examining GROBs competition was…
Get a Load of GROB
Tuesday, our group had our final company visit. On the agenda was GROB which happens to be my company for the final presentation. Going into this class, I honestly had never heard of GROB. As a family owned company in Germany, I wouldn’t be surprised if you didn’t know them either. GROB has been around…
Hoerbiger? Oberammergau? Where are we?
It was a sad day Monday, as we have reached the final page of our itinerary. Mondays company visit was to Hoerbiger with a trip later to the town of Oberammergau. I was well rested for Monday since I knew it would be a 12+ hour day. At the company tour we listened to presentations…
Dachau Concentration Camp
After a long day in Munich, we visited the World War II concentration camp Dachau on Sunday. I’m a history minor at Pitt with a focus on WWII and the Holocaust. “Excitement” isn’t the word I would use to describe how I felt about going, but I was looking forward to learning more about the…
Mia san mia!
Saturday was pretty much a free day. We departed from Augsburg via train to Munich to spend the day there. Munich, like the other cities we visited was welcoming with a historic atmosphere. With a population over one million, the city obviously felt much larger than the other Bavarian cities we visited. There was far…
Pitt takes on Neuschwanstein
On Friday, we journeyed to the alps to visit the beautiful castle Neuschwanstein. The bus ride to the location was very scenic. As the mountains approached, excitement grew as I have never seen such large snow capped mountains. Upon arrival, the air was cold and thin but the view of the still water and tall…
Can I whip the R8?
Thursday our day trip was to Audi. This was most definitely the company tour I was looking forward to most. The facility was in the town of Ingolstadt which was dominated by the vast size of Audi’s plant. When we first arrived, we walked through the Audi museum which was any car fanatics dream. On…
Continental Divide
Our fourth day in Germany was another company visit, this time to Continental. I had only known Continental as a tire brand, but interestingly enough, this site did not produce tires at all. The first thing we did upon arrival was listen to a guest speaker talk about the logistics of shop floor planning. In…
MAN I love Nuremberg
Tuesday consisted of a two hour bus ride to Nuremberg and we were greeted by lovely cobblestone streets, decorative buildings, and wonderful churches. My only knowledge of Nuremberg going into Tuesday was the association with the Nuremberg trials. To my surprise, Nuremberg is actually a big city, roughly half a million people. An interesting fact…
Day 2 – Augsburg U
We were greeted with the warm hospitality of the University of Augsburg. During our visit, we had the opportunity to hear Will Wilkes speak about the current state and future of Germany’s automotive industry. I found his presentation both impressive and highly engaging. He highlighted the significant gap between the Asian and German electric vehicle…
First Day Out
After a long day of travel on Saturday, we finally touched down at Munich Airport around 7 a.m. Sunday. By the time we made it to Augsburg, running on zero sleep and full-blown jet lag, my top priority was finding an Augsburg cappuccino. After that was acquired, we toured the city as a group. I…
Introduction Blog – Max Beecher
Hello everyone! My name is Max Beecher, I am currently a sophomore dual majoring in Accounting & Finance with minors in Economics & History. After my four years at Pitt I aspire to work at a big 4 accounting firm either in a major city, hopefully Boston. This summer I will probably work in Lancaster,…
The Last Hurrah
Thursday was our last full day in Seoul. It was also the first day where we were able to sleep in. The meeting time was 11 am so I was able to eat, shower and get dressed while not having to worry about time which was nice. After meeting at 11, we took the subway…
Buddha’s Birthday
After visiting four companies over the last two days, today was less formal and more relaxed. First, we hopped on the bus at 8:45am and drove to the Hanok village. At this village, all of the houses were traditionally built and it was a residential area. I find it fascinating that this neighborhood has become…
Tech Trek
Today was another day of company visits. First, we started at the hotel and took the bus to HY. HY makes yogurt products in South Korea. When we arrived we had to wear provided sandals for sanitary reasons. Then, we were given a tour in Korean which was interesting. Unfortunately the factory was not running…
Going Up?
Today we started as usual in the hotel, after breakfast we met at 8:30am for departure to Assan. At Assan, we toured a Hyundai manufacturing plant and then in the afternoon, the TK Elevators facility. Each was certainly educational and equally interesting. Before each of the visits, we stopped for lunch. The lunch set up…
A Path to Korean Culture
Going into today I was wondering what a Korean national park would be like. I had no idea how difficult the terrain would be or the kind of scenery. When we arrived at the base of the park, it seemed very similar to an American hiking trail. The trail was pretty easy, most of it…
Korea’s D.M.Z.
Today I visited the DMZ. I was up at 5am expecting a 6am bus departure. We arrived at the DMZ parking lot around 7 and waited for the ticket booths to open in order to purchase tickets. While we waited, there were a few historical landmarks and informational posters. After we waited, we hopped back…