Member Article

SAMSONITE REINFORCES PRODUCTION CAPACITY WITH ITS THIRD EUROPEAN ASSEMBLY PLANT COVERING 20,000M2 IN HUNGARY

People travel more than ever before, which clearly offers interesting business opportunities for Samsonite. But the way people travel is changing. That is why Samsonite is continually striving to adapt and improve its range of suitcases and its production facilities. A new assembly plant in Szekszárd near the Hungarian capital, Budapest, promises to bring forth the ultimate in future-proof travel gear.

In order to reinforce its production capacity, Samsonite is opening up a new production plant in Hungary. This is the second Hungarian factory for Samsonite and the third one in Europe: the brand also has a production site in Oudenaarde, Belgium. “At our new assembly plant in Szekszárd, Hungary, we have integrated state-of-the-art technology, just like we do in our products. It is fully controlled by the latest software, which gives us the possibility, for instance, to adjust heating, cooling and lighting power at any given moment. Solar panels generate our hot water. As the safety of our 750 employees is essential, an alarm goes off in the event of any failure in the boiler room”, plant director József Pinczel tells us.

The plant opened in September 2017 under the watchful eye of Samsonite Europe President Arne Borrey. The new plant is near the rst Hungarian Samsonite plant, which has been operational for years. Each of them cover about 20,000 square meters. With an impressive total surface area of 40,000 square meters – two thirds of which is intended for production and one third as a warehouse – around 15 different collections for the European market will be produced at the optimized Hungarian plant.

The 2017 Interim results show a net sales growth of 7,0% of the Samsonite brand. A strong growth fueled additionally by the continuous growth in the travel industry. “In total we will produce 1.2 million items in 2017 and 1.4 million items in 2018. So European production capacity will increase with almost 17% due to this second Hungarian assembly plant alone.We are reinforcing our reputation as a European brand – ‘Made in Europe’ – and will continue to do so in the future. At the new plant, we will produce Neopulse from the Poly Carbonate Collection and models such as Lite-Cube, Cosmolite and Lite-Box”, Pinczel explains.

“The latter, Lite-Box, is part of our newest Curv© collection.These suitcases are the lightest but also the sturdiest in their class. Thanks to reinforcements in the right places, such as on the corners, they are more robust than ever before.These innovations have recently been rewarded with a Red Dot Award.”

With this new plant, Samsonite clearly aims to highlight the importance of the ‘Made in Europe’ label. According to Statista’s Made-In-Country Index (MICI) this label is still the third most appreciated label in the world, after ‘Made in Germany’ and ‘Made in Switzerland’.The main features that make people relate to this label are ‘quality’ and ‘security standards’, but it also stands for ‘short transportation distances’ (i.e. environmentally friendly) and ‘fair working conditions’.This label evokes trust in people all over the planet. Samsonite strongly believes in the features of the label.That is why the company has consciously chosen to strengthen its production capacity in the European Union.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Business News .