Operation Report
OR
OR
Operation Report
IS COVID-19 THE TIPPING POINT FOR ACCELERATED GROWTH IN THE BRAZILIAN TISSUE MARKET? With over 70% of production dedicated to the At-Home market, one of Brazil’s leading tissue manufacturers Mili saw sales grow 18% in 2020 – and expects a 10% increase in 2021. Technical Director Daniel Signori talks to Senior Editor Helen Morris about going the extra mile.
Production boost: Mili now has three industrial units based in Curitiba-PR, Maceió-AL, and Três Barras-SC (pictured)
B
razil has always been the country with a vast - but untapped - opportunity for the tissue and towel market. It is the world's fifth-largest country by area, and the sixth most populous. It has all the demographics needed for a thriving tissue and towel market: a young population of 212.6m people living across 8.5m square kilometres of land, a love of socialising, and a consumption culture. Yet even in the nine years since TWM last visited the country for our Brazilian Country Report, the reasons why the country’s potential remains untapped across many of its geographical regions remain ever present. Over the course of the last decade Brazil has experienced a few major recession periods. And when the pandemic arrived after ten years of stagnant economic growth, it brought with it unemployment, a further increase in inequality and poverty, and a drop in the country’s vital tourism trade. Brazilians have been earning less, 18
Tissue World Magazine | September/October 2021
DEMAND FOR HIGH-QUALITY TISSUE PRODUCTS IN BRAZIL WAS QUICKLY INCREASING, AND THE COMPANY WAS SEEING A BOOST IN 2-PLY TOILET PAPER SALES. MILI AND MANY OTHER BRAZILIAN TISSUE BUSINESSES WERE SEARCHING FOR HIGHER QUALITY, SOFTNESS AND BRIGHTNESS TO MATCH RAPIDLY CHANGING CONSUMER TRENDS, AND HEAVILY INVESTING TO KEEP UP WITH THE COMPETITION. THE INFLUENCE OF THE PANDEMIC HAS BOOSTED TISSUE INVESTMENTS EVEN FURTHER. spending less, and socialising less. But does the start of 2022 mark the pivotal moment when Brazil can start to move forward from the “lost decade”? If we look at tissue – always a sensitive indicator of a nation’s economic health and at the case of Brazil’s leading tissue manufacturer Mili, it could seem so. TWM first met Mili’s Technical Director Daniel Signori in 2012 at the company’s Três
Barras facility in the Santa Catarina state. The business had just started an investment programme that added 70,000tpy to its overall production. Demand for highquality tissue products in Brazil was quickly increasing, and the company was seeing a boost in 2-ply toilet paper sales. Mili and many other Brazilian tissue businesses were searching for higher quality, softness and brightness to match rapidly changing