“Despite the turbulence on raw material markets and the much increased costs of all production factors, which jeopardized many segments, we will achieve a turnover exceeding 2.1 billion euros at the end of the year, with an EBITDA of more than 300,000 million”, highlighted Marco Nespolo, CEO of the Fedrigoni group, at the press conference held in Paris on November 18, 2022. Nespolo also made the group’s latest purchase official: French paper company Zuber Rieder.
In the third quarter 2022, Fedrigoni’s turnover reached 547 million euros, i.e. +36% compared to the third quarter 2021. Of course, the group’s growth is related to the purchases in strategic geographical and industrial hubs, which played a key role, but also to Fedrigoni’s transformative sustainable strategy.
Six purchases in six months, including two in France and two in Spain
The latest purchase is not the least: Zuber Rieder, “a French gem specialized in high quality paper for label fronts and luxury packaging”, explains Nespolo.
In October, the group purchased Guarro Casas, a Spanish company specialized in high-end paper. In September, Fedrigoni signed a contract in the US with American company Mohawk, to extend its presence on the North-American continent. Earlier, in July, the group was in Turkey to purchase Unifol, a company which makes self-adhesive materials for vehicle wrapping. In March, it was the French Montpellier-based company Tageos which was purchased: an expert of smart labels and radio-identification – usually called RFID, for Radio Frequency Identification. Ultimately, last February, self-adhesives Spanish company Divipa also joined the group.
Thanks to this external growth, the Fedrigoni group asserts its leadership on the luxury packaging and labelling markets, including the French, for cosmetics, fashion, wine and spirits players, but also on other, new segments like the food, household, and hygiene product industries. Right now, Fedrigoni’s industrial park counts eleven production sites, 29 sales offices, and almost 20 machines of various sizes, only for the paper division.
“This considerable number of machines makes us extremely agile and definitely shortens our delivery times, even for special, tailor-made products,” says Nespolo. “Right now, it is a much valuable argument, in particular in the luxury world, where demand varies a lot,” he adds.
A platinum medal awarded by the Ecovadis agency in 2022
Last June, Fedrigoni received a platinum medal from global agency Ecovadis: the group was ranked in the top 1% of companies in this segment on the global level, which emphasizes its commitment for sustainability.
“As a company with high energy consumption, the trickiest task is to reduce CO2 emissions. Our ESG roadmap for 2030 includes the following objectives: reduce emissions by 30%, restore over 95% of clean water in the environment (we have already reached 97%), and upgrade 100% of our waste for full circularity (we have already reached 89%). In addition, by 2030, we will only make fully recyclable products”, explains Nespolo.
