As Poslovni Dnevnik/Sergej Novosel Vuckovic writes, the pandemic which struck during spring last year was a prime time for production for the Zagreb Delt Papir company, and it was necessary for them to work in three shifts at their Jankomir plant, because due to the general shortage of toilet paper throughout Europe, many turned to them to meet their increasing demands.
The Zagreb Delt Papir company sometimes had to reject requests for more of their products, but despite that, the whole of 2020 can be considered successful for this enterprise, not only by the fact that with revenues of 130 million kuna they approached the levels of their record year of pre-pandemic 2019, but also because of the fact that at the end of the year they started working on the conceptual design of their brand new Ola’la products.
Launched only relatively recently, a few years after their last hit, which was lemon-scented kitchen towels, the Zagreb Delt Papir company has marketed new types of rolls of paper towels and toilet paper.
“We started this story by deciding to make a roll of paper towels that is very tall, as tall as 27 centimetres, and the cellulose we use has much stronger absorbent properties and pronounced strength. We focused on gathering the experiences of our customers and designed a product tailored to every modern household – Ola’la Butler paper towels in three packaging variants. The product is for every household, regardless of whether the person spends very little time there or a lot (today a large number of people work from home),” stated the directors and co-owners of the Zagreb Delt Papir company, Krunoslav Kisak and Alen Krajacic.
The Zagreb Delt Papir products also meet strict environmental certificates, since their so-called ”I’m green foil” is made from 60 percent green polyethylene derived from sugar cane.
We’re paying more and more attention to the materials, so we “wrapped” the entire professional segment in ”I’m green” foil. In the production process, we recycle all recycled surpluses and reuse them in certain products,” they explained from Delt Papir. The new paper, Ola’la Premium, is said to be made with new technology.
“We use super soft, but very durable cellulose that leaves a soft touch on the skin. We believe that there can be no room for compromise when it comes to personal hygiene because, as we’ve been witnessing for more than a year now, it’s extremely closely related to health,” the company’s leaders noted.
With cellulose, as an unsustainable raw material in the production of a necessary item, things are becoming more difficult and more expensive.
”The prices of raw materials have been rising sharply for all raw materials, especially when it comes to paper and packaging (cardboard and foil), and accordingly, production prices are rising sharply. The predictions are that it will continue to grow, and we’re following the trends with the hope that this disturbance on the market will slowly come back under control,” they explained. Since they’re innovating as a company, at the beginning of last summer they were able to adapt to the conditions of the pandemic and introduce a new product: protective masks, which were also in short supply on the market, even in the case of those produced in China.
“Yes, last year we decided to go with a new production segment practically overnight because we struggled with the purchase of protective masks for our employees. Today, we’re present in large retail chains such as Lidl and Kaufland, and more recently on the shelves of Dm, and we also supply various distributors. The market struggle with cheaper Chinese goods is of course present, but given our certifications and Croatian production, we try to be competitive and continue with this segment because the demand for masks is actually increasing. So far, we’ve produced and sold more than ten million masks,” stated Kisak and Krajacic.
The Zagreb Delt Papir company currently has 85 employees, with their number growing to 100 in the event of higher demand for their products. The company exports 53 percent of its production to 26 countries, to most of the EU and Switzerland, and their new markets are Finland, Iceland, Dubai, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
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