Get a business address for your website's Impressum

If you run a website, online shop, monetised blog or business social-media presence in Germany, you almost certainly need an Impressum (provider identification). The duty lives in § 5 of the Digitale-Dienste-Gesetz (DDG), which replaced the Telemediengesetz (TMG) on 14 May 2024 – the content of the duty is unchanged, only the statute it sits in. It applies to digital services offered "geschäftsmäßig" (on a business-like basis, typically for payment), which in practice covers nearly every commercial or professional site. Purely private or family pages are exempt; once there's a commercial purpose – adverts, affiliate links, sponsorships, a shop or a professional offer – the duty applies.

The Impressum must be easy to find, directly reachable and permanently available, and it must include your name and the address at which you are established, your contact details and – for registered companies – your legal form, your representatives and your commercial-register and VAT details.

The Impressum must state a ladungsfähige Anschrift – a serviceable address: a real, physical street address in Germany where you can actually be reached and where official and court documents can be served. Two consequences follow:

• A P.O. box is not enough. A Postfach does not qualify as a ladungsfähige Anschrift, so it can't stand alone in your Impressum.
• The address has to be one where you can actually be reached. Each Olea location is a staffed office, so there's always someone on site during business hours to accept your post – including official and legal documents – on your behalf.

An Olea business address is a real, staffed office – not a mail-drop or a P.O. box – so it works as the serviceable address in your Impressum, and our on-site reception means your legal post is genuinely received.

For solo founders, freelancers, creators and small businesses, the Impressum is often the one place the law forces a private address into public view – and that address is then trivially scraped by anyone, including competitors and the lawyers who send warning letters (Abmahnungen) for the smallest formal defect. Publishing an office address instead keeps your home private while still satisfying the law. It's worth being precise about formal compliance too: an Impressum that still cites the old "§ 5 TMG" is now out of date and itself a potential Abmahnung target, so reference the current § 5 DDG (or simply label the section "Impressum").

Because an Olea address is a real, serviceable office, it isn't limited to your Impressum: the same address can be used for your Gewerbeanmeldung, the Handelsregister and your Finanzamt correspondence – which sets it apart from the cheap "Impressum-only" mailing services that explicitly cannot be used for those registrations. What an address does not do is decide your tax position: a business address is not automatically your place of management (Ort der Geschäftsleitung) or a permanent establishment (Betriebsstätte). Those depend on where you actually run your business and are assessed by the Finanzamt – if your situation isn't clear-cut, check with your tax adviser.

1. 1Choose your address & location (≈5 minutes) – pick the city and location that becomes your published business address.
2. 2Checkout & compliance check (≈10–15 minutes) – complete our initial compliance check, a legal requirement under the German Anti-Money Laundering Act (GwG) for every business address, covering your ID and business details.
3. 3Activate & get your documents – once you're activated, generate your consent-to-use documentation (Nutzungsüberlassungserklärung) from the Customer Portal confirming your right to use the address.
4. 4Publish it in your Impressum – replace your home address with your Olea address (using the current § 5 DDG framing), and start receiving any legal post in your digital mailbox.