Podravka sold Studenac to Czech Kofola, production remains in Lipik

The Czech company Kofola is the new majority owner of Studenac in Lipik. Radenska, which is also owned by Kofola, will take over a 100% stake in Studenac by the end of the year, and a contract has been signed with the union that protects all acquired rights of approximately 115 employees in the company for 18 months.

The CEO of Podravka, Zvonimir Mrišić, described the sale of the stake in Studenac to Kofola as a continuation of Podravka’s restructuring and greater efficiency, as the management assessed that Studena water has greater development potential under the umbrella of this multinational company.

– In addition to the share sale agreement, a contract has been signed with the union, ensuring that all acquired rights of the workers will be respected. We have also taken into account the interests of the local community, so it has been agreed that the company’s headquarters will remain in Lipik, said Mršić.

Kofola, which previously purchased the brands Inka, Nara, and Voćko from Badel 1862, the Slovenian Radenska, and now Studenac, has recognized the interest in developing local brands. After this investment, which has remained a business secret, their intention is to analyze the production capacities in Lipik, transfer part of the production of their brands from Slovenia back to Croatia, which means that, according to the announcement by Jannis Samaras, CEO of Kofola ČeskoSlovensko, Inka and Nara are coming home.

– The factory in Lipik is very beautiful, one of the nicer ones I have seen. We want to invest in water, especially flavored water, and we are considering transferring part of the production to those facilities. We want to retain all 115 employees and hire 30 to 40 new people in sales. Depending on how production goes, we plan to increase the number of employees, said Samaras.

Thus, the factory in Lipik should become Kofola’s headquarters for Croatia, as once they conduct more detailed analyses of production potentials, they want to transfer part of the production of other beverages, unknown to the wider Croatian public, to that city. Otherwise, Kofola ČeskoSlovensko is a European producer of non-alcoholic beverages, with six production facilities and 1,900 employees in Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Croatia, and Poland.

While Kofola plans to conquer the domestic market for mineral waters with Studena, the plans for Inka, Nara, and Voćko are far more ambitious. These brands are considered extremely significant by Kofola, and their desire is, as Samaras said, “…to develop them into multinational brands, because that is our business, we have done it with some other brands in some other countries.”