Every Tuesday, the great hall of the Kaiserstiftung Riemerling is very busy from 9 a.m. Today there are bowls of sliced apricots and apples on the tables, crates of lemons and raspberries in their original packaging are stacked next to them, and a serving trolley full of nectarines is waiting outside in the hallway. A dozen women in aprons rush back and forth between pots and tables, chattering and laughing, dragging and snipping, stirring and decorating. Tuesday is preserving day at “Mammalade für Karla”: For six years, the association’s volunteer team has been rescuing overripe fruit from the bin and using it to cook fruit spreads, with the proceeds going to support homeless women in the “Karla 51” emergency shelter run by the Evangelisches Hilfswerk.
Helene Nestler from Ottobrunn in the Munich district came up with this seven years ago: “I sold the first glasses at a stand on the tennis court,” recalls the 68-year-old with shoulder-length white hair and bright blue eyes. In the meantime, “Mammalade” has become a charity empire with 30 volunteers working in shifts, including vacation planning. Since 2016, it has saved around 11,500 kilos of fruit, raised 175,000 euros and helped homeless women in and around Munich with everyday needs, children’s equipment, the annual outing and a festive Christmas meal.
Helene Nestler is one of those multi-talents without whom society would be much poorer. Anyone who speaks to her feels at home immediately: Nestler is cordial with no ulterior motives, she makes the most surprising contacts in a motley network, she has a keen antenna for people, is pragmatic and goal-oriented. The voluntary “career” of the trained bank clerk began long before “Mammalade”, and the focus has always been on women. “Women are still the weakest in our society,” says Helene Nestler. “You always have to struggle to balance everything – especially when there’s domestic violence involved.”
Her own mother suffered under a dominant man; Helene experienced them as weak and adjusted. “That’s how we children were raised,” she recalls. When her first daughter was born, Helene Nestler was a single parent: “It was only with her that I became strong,” she says. So she got involved with the “Women’s Lobby Ottobrunn” early on, looked after a prisoner in the Aichach women’s prison and later helped in the café of the “Karla 51” women’s shelter. In 2004 she switched to worker welfare as an administrative worker and project manager.
The start of “Mammalade” in 2017 with the patron, the then regional bishop Susanne Breit-Keßler (left), Pastor Mathis Steinbauer and Helene Nestler.
(Photo: Claus Schunk)
“That was the big bang, I could really let off steam,” remembers the tackler. Already in 2006 she founded the neighborhood help. In 2008, the first used department store “Klawotte” followed, of which there are now six branches that have long been running without Helene Nestler’s intervention. In 2012 she took over the management of the senior citizens’ meeting of the Kaiserstiftung, followed in 2017 by the founding of “Mammalade” under the patronage of the then regional bishop Susanne Breit-Keßler. Nestler suspected early on that the concept could become a hit: “The combination of saving fruit, volunteering and helping homeless women does it – everyone immediately has a picture in their mind, that’s our recipe for success.” Especially since there are real exotics among the spread varieties: “Apple-quince-grape – nobody makes that at home,” she is convinced.
The canteen manager of the State Chancellery is also among the customers
Today “Mammalade” sells its fruit spreads in supermarkets, bakeries, bulk shops and at weekly markets between Munich and Bad Tölz, Ottobrunn and Ebersberg. Dazzling names are also among the customers: the Bavarian State Chancellery, whose canteen manager is one of the big supporters, and the Munich Marriott bring “Mammalade” to the table. However, the well-known hotel is the latest addition: “We could continue to grow, but we mustn’t overwhelm our volunteers either,” says Helene Nestler. Most of the women are 65 plus, many of them single or widowed.
The fact that the team also supports each other outside of the preserving Tuesdays is a welcome side effect. “Volunteering has to be fun – and for us it’s also a way to combat loneliness,” says the boss. In the meantime, Nestler has handed over the operational business to a fellow campaigner and is mainly responsible for fundraising and public relations. “Mammalade,” she says with satisfaction, is her last social project: “It’s absolutely round.”