News | RTL Group | Cologne, 03/02/2022

RTL Deutschland Continues Expanding Its Charity Activities

In the future, reporting about the activities of “Stiftung RTL – Wir helfen Kindern” will occur more frequently and will be networked cross-media. New formats with Head of Charity Wolfram Kons are planned. He will take a leave of absence from presenting the daily morning journal “Guten Morgen Deutschland” for this purpose.

In a socially and globally challenging time, RTL is planning to sustainably strengthen its charity commitment. The expansion of the activities pooled in the DZI-certified “Stiftung RTL – Wir helfen Kindern” will be responsibility of the longtime Head of Charity and RTL presenter Wolfram Kons. In addition to the annual “RTL-Spendenmarathon”, which the journalist manages and hosts, Kons will also be regularly reporting about the growing importance of sustainable social commitment and the activities of the RTL foundation during the year, cross-media networked, on all of RTL Deutschland’s platforms. Wolfram Kons, who is also the Chair of Stiftung RTL, will take a leave of absence from presenting the daily morning journal “Guten Morgen Deutschland” for this purpose. He will continue to host the “RTL-Spendenmarathon” and present the art journal “NTV Inside Art”.

“We are clearly expanding our social commitment at RTL Deutschland and will increasingly orchestrate it during the year cross-media across our media genres,” said Stephan Schäfer, CEO “Stiftung RTL – Wir helfen Kindern” and Co-CEO of RTL Deutschland. “I am pleased that Wolfram Kons is taking on the strategic overall responsibility. He is the driving force and face of Stiftung RTL and our charity activities. We can see proof of this again right now with the war in Ukraine.” With 31 years as a morning host, Wolfram Kons holds a unique record on German television. As a presenter and inventor of the art show “NTV Inside Art”, Kons is celebrating his tenth anniversary this year and will continue accompanying stars of the art scene, including Gerhard Richter and Julian Schnabel, up-close and personal with the camera.

A total of €222 million raised through “RTL-Spendenmarathon”

  “Helping children in Germany and around the world has always been an absolute matter of the heart for me,” said Wolfram Kons. “It makes me proud that we are now further expanding this commitment. Our efforts for children in need throughout the year goes far beyond the 24 hours of the annual ‘RTL-Spendenmarathon’. My biggest hope is that we will be able to help even more children, who urgently need support, in the future. Never before have solidarity and cohesion been more important than today. In Ukraine alone, it’s a matter of life and death for almost 7.5 million children and their families. At the same time, I will take a leave of absence from hosting our ‘RTL-Morgenmagazin’. I am deeply grateful for more than 30 fulfilling and exciting years with a fantastic team of early birds. And I am already looking forward to the new, expanded tasks and, to be honest, also to being able to sleep a bit longer.”  Wolfram Kons has been committed to the cause of children in need since 1996 and has received many awards, including the Federal Cross of Merit and the Order of Merit of the State of North-Rhine Westphalia. He is RTL’s Head of Charity and Vice Chairman of “Stiftung RTL – Wir helfen Kindern”. This year, he will host the “RTL-Spendenmarathon”, the longest charity show on German television, for the 27th time. In 2021, a new record was set with donations amounting to €23.4 million. In total, Stiftung RTL has raised over €222 million and sustainably supported hundreds of children’s relief projects. Last week, a large-scale relief campaign for Ukraine was launched.