“We are a lucky industry, and in our case demand for the group brands (Beko, Grundig and Arctic i.e.) is high. Although it is the second largest refrigerator plant in Europe and the largest in the EU, the capacity of the plant in Gaesti, Dambovita, is no longer enough,” Ragip Balcioglu, CCO Arcelik Group, Arctic owner, says.
As a result, the group has already started a new investment project to boost capacity by 10%, the executive added at the end of last year.
In comparison, Romania made almost 7 billion lei worth of home appliances in 2019 , according to the latest publicly available data, with the market increasing by 6% but being four times larger than a decade ago.
Romania’s home appliances manufacturing industry is developing in full swing, with new plants opening, smaller plants being acquired by larger actors and arrival of giants.
Turkey’s Arcelik has two plants in Romania, a refrigerator plant in Gaesti and washing machine plant in Ulmi, Dambovita County. The Ulmi facility was an over EUR100 milion investment partly funded by state aid that was inaugurated in 2019.
The group handles all its Romanian operations via a single company, which posted more than RON2.5 billion revenue in 2019.
Arctic is the largest manufacturer of home appliances in Romania by revenue, followed by De’Longhi (espresso machines and other small appliances) and Philips (espresso machines and oral hygiene products). There are only seven large companies in this business in Romania at the moment, six that make finished goods and one that makes parts.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)