For the owner of the Violeta brand, the amount is over 100 million Euro
Who is Petar Ćorluka, the man who employs over 900 people in three states and is expanding through geometric progression? First off, he proudly stresses “never buying anything through privatisation, all I’ve created is the fruit of work, vision and business moves,” Poslovni Dnevnik writes on June 15, 2016.
Coming from a poor farming family, he tested his business desires in 1990 when private businesses were made legal. He left his position as legal assistant and founded the Prodex company, importing southern fruit with several associates.
He developed retail, opened supermarkets and represented a line of well known food brands. He concluded some products are needlessly imported so he decided to go into manufacturing. He considers it a logical course as “money is first made in trade and then any serious businessman wants to invest in production, as production creates new value,” Ćorluka says.
He didn’t enter the “hygiene” business by chance. He deals with fast selling goods that are in demand even in crisis.
The Violeta company was founded in 2001, with the Violeta brand launched a year later. They began producing toilet paper, handkerchiefs, wet wipes, diapers and finally detergents and softeners.
A great leap forward came in 2011 when they opened a plant in Sveta Helena near Zagreb, through a 12 million Euro investment, producing toilet paper and paper towels. The Violeta towels found their consumers quite fast.
The lightning growth of the company based in Grude was mandated by quality and innovation of products, but also an excellent marketing campaign making them at home in almost all regional countries. They invested 80,000 Euro in the innovative promotion.
After 15 years Violeta has over 100 million Euro annual income, employs over 900 worker in 13 branches in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, has a fleet of over 300 vehicles in its own distribution, an assortment with over 200 products in 15 hygiene categories.
Of the three modern production facilities, two are in Grude and one near Zagreb.
The newest complex in Grude, worth 20 million Euro, is technologically advanced, special by the highest ecological principles – powered by solar energy, drawing water from its own source and creating zero waste.
Petar Ćorluka has a simple recipe for success – a man must do what he loves and better than the competition- TO successfully run a company, it’s paramount to build a system. He doesn’t practice an authoritarian, but rather a democratic management style.
