The master mason Josef Klein founded a small construction company at Marktstraße 73 in the city of Niederkassel-Rheidt in 1933. Up into the years after the first world war, the company mainly built single-family houses or conducted building modifications or repairs.

One after the other, the sons of the founder entered the company: Karl-Josef Klein in 1948, Hans Klein in 1951 and Helmut Klein in 1959. Their goal-oriented commitment set the foundation for the construction company to grow strongly and continuously. The reconstruction years after the war as well as the construction boom in the sixties and seventies favoured this development further.

Large projects, which the company successfully completed in the sixties for example,

• a hospital in Siegburg,
• a district vocational school in Siegburg,
• a high school in Westerburg,
• the Federal Ministry for the Treasury in Bonn-Bad Godesburg,
• dormitories in Aachen,
• a secondary modern school in Menden and
• the city hall in Siegburg
  founded the reputation of the company far beyond the borders of the region. Thus, nothing more could stand in the way of the company developing to its current size.

Due to an increasing number of business activities as well as of employees, the company location was moved to the industrial zone in Rheidt, at Marktstraße 104. Since 1968, Josef Klein GmbH & Co KG has been located here, along with administration, building yard and storage areas. It is managed by the third generation of the Klein family.