Leading the way in hygienic disposables Ontex

in Bollebygd manufactures water-based and solvent-based paint, wood preservative, cleaning products, and filler while at Bankeryd brushes and rollers are made. At the factory in Bodafors, plastic handles for brushes, rollers and filling knives, as well as other plastic components, such as lids and packaging, are manufactured.

The most recently established Flügger factory is situated in Gdansk. This is the most modern wallpaper factory in Europe. “We also have a factory in Shanghai, China, where we manufacture water-based paint, primer and wallpaper adhesive. Here, production, which began in 2009, has nearly doubled since the first year,” says a company spokesperson.

A better understanding

The group’s retail chain, Flügger Décor, has approximately 600 shops across Scandinavia, eastern Europe and China. Flügger owns about half of these stores.

The shops have maintained their core focus on professional quality, and this concept has proved its viability in a wide array of markets.

“As opposed to traditional retail shop chains, we develop, produce and sell our own products. This provides us with an important knowledge about our customers,” says the company spokesperson. “We believe we have seen such success because we have this distribution network that allows us to be close to our customers. This also means we understand them very well.”

The group has set out certain targets for its 2013–15 strategy. It wants to achieve a market-leading, professional standard – “#1 Go Pro is the target” – and also to increase its EBIT margin by a little more than one per cent per year, with a view to re-achieving an EBIT margin of 8–10 per cent. n

Bjørn Thorsen A/S is among one of the few larger independent distributors in the Nordic countries.

Our flexible organisation and highly skilled employees give us the possibility to understand and operate in the dynamic business environment of today.

Our strong position gives us the capability to provide the industry with technical and processing know-how and efficient logistic service.

We represent only the leading manufacturers of special raw materials to the industries within the areas of our expertise.

We bring solutions!

www.bjorn-thorsen.com

LEADING THE

WAY IN HYGIENIC DISPOSABLES

Under its new leadership, Ontex is expanding its skills base, its geographical presence and its branded products business while continuing an ambitious programme to reduce its environmental impact. Peter Mercer talks to its new CEO.

IN January of this year Ontex, a European market leader in hygienic disposable products for baby, feminine and adult care, acquired a new CEO. Charles Bouaziz took over the leadership of the Belgium headquartered group from Michael Teacher, who had been CEO since 2006.

Welcoming the new CEO, Ontex Chairman, Adrian Bellamy, emphasised how important his role would be in continuing the successful track record of the business and the expansion into new geographies and new growth areas that had been achieved by Michael Teacher and CFO Chris Parratt over the past six years. “Charles Bouaziz’ focus will be to use his extensive experience in fast-moving consumer goods to continue strengthening the Group’s performance,” he said.

In fact, Mr Bouaziz has spent most of his career in the consumer goods industry, including five years in marketing with P&G and nearly 20 years at PepsiCo, where he was appointed as the president of PepsiCo Western Europe in 2008. He was subsequently CEO of Monoprix before joining French private equity company PAI in 2011.

Beginning as a family company in Zele, Belgium, Ontex has grown into a global operation with sales of more than €1.4 billion and around 5200 employees across the globe. It currently operates 15 manufacturing facilities in 11 countries. Ontex has built up its position as a European market leader in hygienic disposables through a determined focus on retailer brands. Its strategically located manufacturing plants enable it to optimise logistics and deliver

products to customers with maximum efficiency and timeliness. In recent years, Ontex has also grown its own brands, especially in emerging markets and in the healthcare sector. In fact, production now breaks down into a 60/40 ratio between retail and own brands.

The company’s Retail Division is primarily concerned with the development, production and sale of baby care, feminine care and adult incontinence products to retailers across Europe. Ontex also produces and sells its own branded products under names such as Helen Harper, Moltex and Babycharm. The Healthcare division similarly focuses on the development, production and sale of adult incontinence products to institutional customers in the healthcare market. The main Ontex brands here are Serenity, ID and Euron.

Ontex also has an important operation in Turkey which similarly produces and sells baby care, feminine care and adult incontinence products across Turkey and neighbouring markets. Here the main brands are Canbebe, Helen Harper and Canped.

Expanding branded business

It is this expansion into the production and marketing of its own brands while strengthening the retailer brands that Charles Bouaziz sees as his most immediate priority. “Ontex is

a very strong company, with streamlined and highly efficient manufacturing sites and a clear focus on product development and innovation,” he explains. “But as we move from our historic focus on European retailer brands towards more geographical markets and the expansion of our own branded business we need to develop a broader set of skills, specifically in marketing. Carefully balancing retailer brands and own brands will accelerate our growth. We need to be thoroughly professional in this area, especially since in tough economic times consumers tend to go for products with the best price/quality ratio.”

Mr Bouaziz adds that Ontex has fascinating growth opportunities across the world. “In western Europe there is still plenty of room to expand our retail business in baby care and feminine care products, particularly as other major producers exit the market, and an ageing population means growing demand for our incontinence products. Beyond Europe there are many countries that are experiencing very high growth in birth rates so there is a huge demand for baby care products such as nappies, wipes, pants etc. We need to identify the most promising markets and move into them, initially through sales and marketing and then, if appropriate, with local production lines.

“Sometimes this can most efficiently be achieved through strategic acquisitions. The addition of Lille Healthcare to the Group in 2011, for example, brought us not only a leading French producer of incontinence products but also an extended coverage in Australia. Now we are opening a nappy production plant in Pakistan and growing our business in the North African markets.”

Acquisitions and rationalisations

Ontex’s presence in the branded and incontinence market was strengthened further in February of this year when it agreed to acquire Artsana Sud SpA from the Artsana Group. Artsana Sud is a leading manufacturer and distributor of incontinence products under the Serenity brand in Italy. “Until this year we had

a limited presence in Italy but now Serenity has brought us an important manufacturing site, products and people,” explains Charles Bouaziz. “And, of course, Serenity is a wellknown brand so its acquisition has accelerated our move into branded healthcare products. We are investigating the opportunity of marketing the Serenity brand throughout Europe to seize its growth potential.”

Ontex has also announced its intention to regroup its production sites in the north of France. The plan is to concentrate its production sites at Arras and Wasquehal into a new facility to be located halfway between the two. Ontex has explained to its employee representatives that no jobs will be lost as a result of this project – all workers will simply transfer to the new, state-of-the-art facility.

“Following our acquisition of Lille Healthcare we were operating two sites in northern France within 50km of each other so it made obvious sense to consolidate production,” says Mr Bouaziz. “We will not only improve manufacturing efficiency but also our inventory and logistics operations. We are currently assessing the options for a greenfield or existing manufacturing site but we are confident that a new single facility will strengthen our operating footprint in France and help us prepare for further growth.”

Environmental priorities

Ontex maintains a strong focus on product development and innovation in order to continually improve the comfort and performance of its products. The role of its R&D teams, which are based in each key manufacturing unit as well as at its Zele headquarters, is to enable the group to work on new concepts and product specifications, to validate new raw materials and to optimise the use of current raw materials.

This R&D effort is closely linked to Ontex’s commitment to minimising the impact of its activities on the environment. Its sustainabil-

Pasaco

Established in 1994, the Polish company Pasaco is a leading producer of niche carbonless copy papers in the world and significant manufacturer of silicone paper in Europe. Pasaco produces silicone paper, which is supplied to many trade industries in the global market. We currently export to over 50 countries worldwide and have a large number of high-profile clients.

We are the main supplier of silicone paper (printed and unprinted) to the global hygienic disposables giant Ontex. Our mission is to respond to our customers’ requirements, wherever they are, with the highest quality products, timely deliveries and dependable service. All our production is certified according to the ISO 9001:2008 and ISO 14001:2004 standards. In addition Pasaco offers FSC® certified product.