Germany needs this factory
Production facility in Papenburg officially opened
It is now officially up and running. Our new factory in Papenburg was officially opened with a ceremony. Years of preparatory work have thus come to a successful conclusion. Klasmann-Deilmann has a new site in Germany.
The event was attended by all those who played a key role in the project’s success, including, in particular, our business partners Schulte & Bruns, Logitech, Janssen & Töbermann and Elektro Funke. The guests also included the team from the new factory, who will henceforth form the backbone of our substrate production.
Managing Director Jan Astrup gave a speech and expressed his gratitude for the sustained and dedicated efforts of the partner companies and the teams responsible at Klasmann-Deilmann. Special thanks were extended to Joshua Elskamp. Moreover, his thanks were also directed at the shareholders of Klasmann-Deilmann. Jan Astrup said: “For a company of our size, a new factory is a major project offering many opportunities, but also risks. We thank our owners for their confidence that we will run this site profitably and to everyone’s satisfaction.”
Reflecting on developments in the horticultural sector in Germany and neighbouring countries, Jan Astrup explained: “Germany needs this factory with state-of-the-art equipment, streamlined processes and a reliable output. The German horticultural sector needs high-performance growing media made from a variety of raw materials. Klasmann-Deilmann is the only substrate manufacturer investing in German horticulture on this scale. We want to demonstrate how important this market is, even though the debate over whether or not to use peat is overshadowing the entire horticultural production sector. We want to show just how important our customers in Germany are to us, as they will henceforth be supplied even more reliably, with even more modern products, and on an even longer-term basis.”
Jannis Staelberg, managing director of the production companies Nord & Süd, looked back on the factory’s development. He recalled how, slowly but surely, the new production facility had taken shape from an idea. Rens Jacobs, managing director of Bol Peat – the new factory’s immediate neighbour and raw materials supplier – presented Jannis Staelberg with a large ‘Yin and Yang’ symbol and said: “This kind of cooperation has stood the test of time for millennia. May it prove just as successful between us.”
The new factory currently produces around 5 m³ per minute. The aim is to increase this to 7–8 m³ per minute in the foreseeable future. By way of comparison, the long-serving factory in Schöninghsdorf produced 3 m³/min. Taking seasonal fluctuations into account, the site’s theoretical maximum capacity is approximately 350,000–400,000 tm³ per year. In the initial phase, production will be around 270,000 m³ per year.
The port location is ideal for a modern and diverse supply of raw materials. Cocos from India and Sri Lanka, peat from the Baltic states, as well as wood fibres and green compost from Germany are available. The factory specialises in loose substrates for horticultural businesses in the DACH region, and in particular for the numerous customers around Papenburg.
This has realised what we had hoped for: a port location with international raw material links and a state-of-the-art factory whose horticultural influence extends as far as southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
