diff --git a/Dockerfile b/Dockerfile
index 0b29a95..57569c9 100644
--- a/Dockerfile
+++ b/Dockerfile
@@ -1,5 +1,7 @@
 FROM alpine:latest
 
+ENV TZ=Etc/UTC
+
 RUN set -ex; \
     \
     mkdir -pm 755 /kiwi-cron; \
@@ -16,6 +18,7 @@ RUN set -ex; \
     \
     apk --no-cache add \
         docker-cli \
+        tzdata \
     ;
 
 COPY bin /usr/local/bin/
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 141c7a5..fe0507d 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -28,6 +28,12 @@ For each subdirectory, a random valid cron schedule is generated, so that:
 
 Cron schedules are regenerated once on each startup, only for directories that have files.
 
+## Time Zones
+
+`kiwi-cron` images include the `tzdata` package and automatically handle `/etc/localtime` on startup. By default, "Etc/UTC" is set as the container time zone.
+
+To use a different time zone, change the container environment variable `TZ` to your liking, e.g. "Europe/Berlin".
+
 ## Finer granularity: The `/kiwi-cron/every` directory
 
 Directories like `/kiwi-cron/every/5_minutes` will run scripts every 5 minutes. 
diff --git a/libexec/kiwi-cron/run_cron b/libexec/kiwi-cron/run_cron
old mode 100644
new mode 100755
index 347aabb..8bfe7eb
--- a/libexec/kiwi-cron/run_cron
+++ b/libexec/kiwi-cron/run_cron
@@ -1,5 +1,9 @@
 #!/bin/sh
 
+# set timezone
+export TZ="${TZ:-Etc/UTC}"
+ln -sf "/usr/share/zoneinfo/${TZ}" "/etc/localtime"
+
 # check for CLI options
 while getopts ':n' rc_optarg; do
   case "${rc_optarg}" in