January the 28th, 2020 – Who still remembers the famous fast Podravka train that has been running from Osijek to Zagreb for many years now? Julijana Matanovic also wrote about it, and many travellers dreamed of the soft seats and the friendly conductors who dealt with the tickets with a smile on their faces. Last week, Podravka’s most famous brand – the beloved Vegeta – celebrated its sixtieth anniversary.
The guests were taken on a rail journey covering six decades (though the train – however, arrived faster) on the route from Zagreb to Koprivnica, and each of the four specially designed wagons presented a part of the past and the development of this incredibly successful product which is sold worldwide, from Australia to China and all the way to Russia.
Vegeta is present in more than fifty countries, and with their sales abroad, they generate more than sixty percent of their revenue. With their specialities and gastronomic highlights, important guests from the world of politics and business joined forces with Stevo Karapandz, the patron saint of Podravka’s cult show, “The Little Secrets of the Great Masters of the Kitchen.”
When the train arrived at the railway station in Koprivnica without delay and blew its whistle – it was time to go back to 1959 and see the old Juha (soup) and Vegeta factory, from where Vegeta set out on its great journey around the world.
At this point exactly six decades ago, the most recognisable Croatian brand embarked on its journey, and over the course of its now sixty years of existence, Vegeta has become an indispensable part of cuisines on five continents, in more than fifty countries around the world.
”Vegeta generates over half a billion kuna of newly created value each year to the Croatian economy, and thanks to its results, we have created and continue develop the whole of Podravka as a brand. Therefore, with Vegeta’s sixtieth birthday, we would like to pay tribute to Professor Zlata Bartl, her team, and generations of Podravka’s people who have built this planetary success for six decades with their knowledge, diligence and love,” said Marin Pucar, CEO of Podravka, emphasising that Vegeta is rightly placed side by side with Croatian athletes and the beautiful Croatian coast as part of a national image, which is well known throughout the world.
But that is not all! The Croatian Design Society opens in Zagreb on the Night of the Museums (Nov muzeja), on January the 31st, 2020, with the exhibition “Vegeta 60 – A package of history: Vegeta’s design and evolution from 1959 to 2019″, an overview of six decades of the graphic and packaging design of this famous product in the curatorial concept of Drazenka Jalsic Ernecic. It will present archival material, photographs, old commercials, clips from the legendary ”Little Secrets of the Great Masters of the Kitchen” and texts that bring to life the story of the brand that generations have lived with.
The museum story of Podravka and Vegeta’s industrial heritage is not only a story of packaging and graphic design and redesign, or of the brand’s development and evolution, but has a far deeper symbolic meaning as a story of space, time, people, research, idea development, innovation, creation, emotion, rethinking and an analytical approach,” Jalsic Ernecic pointed out in the foreword of the exhibition.
Vegeta, happy birthday to you!
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