Looking ahead  

The activities of the company, which is based at Neunkirchen in Germany, cover three product fields. Right to the fore is "Decosa", offering decoration products such as ceiling tiles, decorative covings and rosettes; "Climapor" includes insulating and sealing products (and is to be expanded into a second major business strand); and moulded packaging parts are marketed under the "Secupor" brand name. In particular products made of polysterene for the creation of decorative effects on walls and ceilings were what brought the company success in the seventies and eighties. In contrast, though, it had to cope with considerable sales losses between 1997 and 1999: the product range was no longer "in". However, business is now about to experience an upswing once more. It is hoped that the decisive boost will be provided by the acquisition of Knauf's decoration division, which was previously associated with the French subsidiary Isodeco and the German subsidiary Europor. "By this means," opines managing director Ludger Ewers, "we intend to safeguard our continuing market success in the long term." At the same time, a sum of around ten mio euro is being invested to revamp both logistics and production processes. "In future we intend to make more effort to go over to the marketing of complete concepts as a guarantee of the inventory: sales ratio," affirms marketing director Jürgen Wojcik. The international orientation of the Decosa brand name forms part of this plan. The packaging has also been designed to this effect, with pictograms to show the area of application and product information in ten different languages.
Attractive in-store display of Saarpor products
The company also wants to press ahead with activities at the point of sale through customised promotions, special displays and diversification of the range of goods on commission. And through widening the offer, e.g. by the addition of cork products, it is hoped to tap into new target groups. "The aim of all these measures is to increase space productivity considerably over the next two years and take over as cost leader of Europe," in the words of managing director Ludger Ewers. The Saarpor group was established in 1969. It has production and distribution facilities in Germany, France and Poland in addition to sales agencies in Hungary, the Czech Republic and Turkey. The combined total of around 300 employees achieved annual sales of approximately 50 mio euro, two thirds of which was generated through…