Insight

After putting its investment plans on hold due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Śrubena-Unia, one of the largest manufacturers of industrial fasteners in Europe, is now focused on reintroducing its investment strategy to further develop its production capabilities and improve efficiency.

With a rich tradition in manufacturing, that dates back to 1832, Śrubena-Unia is relatively unique in that it possesses both cold and hot forging technology and offers a wide variety of standard bolts, nuts and screws, as well as custom-made products to drawings, in a full range of materials and coatings, from M5 – M64. The main industries the company supplies include construction, railway, coal mining, machinery, wind power, as well as automotive.

“As a business we are always looking to update and modernise our machine park, where possible, in order to improve efficiency, which is necessary to stay competitive,” explains Tadeusz Jopek, sales and marketing director vice-president at Śrubena-Unia. “Before the pandemic we had very ambitious investment plans that we unfortunately had to pause. However, with the market slowly returning to normal we are looking to reintroduce our strategy. For instance, we are currently looking at investing in several modern cold forming machines so that we can support our customers with their product needs.”

The Covid-19 pandemic; extreme increases in raw material prices; as well as the interruptions within the supply chain over the last 12 months; have highlighted the need for companies to be able to react quickly to such challenges. “A key aspect of business since the pandemic has been how quickly you can react and adapt to situations,” states Tadeusz. “As a company we immediately established additional working groups to support our customers and to also ensure we could make decisions quickly – guaranteeing we provided products and services to customers whilst reducing risk to the business.”

This was especially true in the first half of 2021, when there were huge challenges regarding the availability of raw materials. “Thanks to the structure we had put in place we were able to foresee this situation and managed to book the necessary quantity of raw material in advance,” points out Tadeusz. “Thanks to the good relationships we have with main suppliers, as well as clearly defined logistic paths, we did not suffer so much and were able to continue to provide customers with the products they needed.”

Tadeusz adds: “Security of supply has always been important, but today it is even more important, especially in terms of the costs it could create. The lack of supply over time of a key component, even a low cost component such as a fastener, can have a huge impact on customers – not only potential penalties but the loss of customer confidence.”

Śrubena-Unia believes that such factors, and impacts on the supply chains, could lead to companies reviewing their Far East sources and looking at the feasibility of using more local manufacturers within Europe – where there is less opportunity for the supply chain to be as severely impacted. “Our vision for the coming years is to make sure that Śrubena-Unia continues to be one of the biggest fastener manufacturers in Europe, through the development and investment in both our machinery and products. We believe the situation on the market will let us continue investing in our machine park and we will continue to focus on the construction industry, as well as other sectors, to enable us to continue to grow,” concludes Tadeusz.