Two years ago Jessica Beitzel could only find one bank to fund her acquisition of a funeral parlour in the north-western German town of Dormagen.
While most lenders she approached “jumped at the first hurdle”, she said “the Commerzbank advisers were very co-operative right from the start, always thinking in terms of solutions”.
Her views on a potential takeover of Commerzbank by Italian rival UniCredit, which has built a 21 per cent stake in the German lender, are pragmatic, however. “For me, it’s not important whether the head office is in Milan or Frankfurt — what matters is that they remain customer-orientated and easily accessible,” the 36-year-old told the Financial Times.