It's been 20 years!

This year our company celebrates the 20th anniversary of its activities, which is a great opportunity to summarise the achievements. Let us start with presenting a brief history of emergence and development of the company.

Multichem Sp. z o.o. started its activities on 26 September 1996. At the beginning, the company consisted of three employees - Piotr Muszkieta, Chris Welgraven and Maciej Przybył. The company name is derived from the English words: Multifuncional Chemistry - Multichem. Searching for the answer to the question, what was the impetus to start a business, it is worth to cite the words of one of the founders:

We established a production company to be independent on the large international concerns and work for ourselves - says Piotr Muszkieta.

Since the beginning, the company has sold its products under the brand name PROFIX. The choice of the name was due to the desire to establish the main pillar, namely Professional paint fixing (Professional Fix). The name was supposed to be also easy in spelling and pronunciation, so that the users of each language can remember it easily.

The beginnings were not easy, starting the company in the late 1990s, during the ongoing transformation, required great personal commitment. The company suffered from lack of capital, contacts in the industry and aggressive competition on the market. The first headquarters was located in Poznań, the administrative part was located on 3 Smardzewskiej Street, while the warehouses and the production were on 50 Wołczyńska Street. It is worth to mention that the area available for the company at the beginning was 250 m².

The first products of Profix included clearcoats, hardeners and thinners, which were provided only on the Polish market at the beginning of the activity. Production was only manually, in 200-litre barrels. However, determination and attitude for success were the power that already in the next year allowed to achieve success and gain customer, inter alia in Russia, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belarus, Ukraine and Germany.

Along with the expansion on the foreign markets, the company started to investment in machinery and equipment of the company. The first machines were the second-hand equipment - i.e. the dissolver and the wall stirrer. Both machines have been stored on the company's premises till these days. Then we acquired the pearl mills, the filtration sets, and in addition we started to equip the laboratory, where for a period of 2 years inter alia the Dutch chemist Jan van Laar worked (today he lives and works in the Caribbean).

Over the years, we have dynamically developed by expanding the assortment with new products. Our sales market has reached the farthest corners of the world, and our largest early business partners have stayed with us till these days. An important step in the development means the beginning of production of paints in primary colours. A turning point came in 2000-2001, when the first acrylic and base paints mixing systems were established. The production of such a system required great knowledge and experience.

With the increasing production capacity, we searched for new sales markets and here the promotion on the trade fairs for the automotive industry proved to be helpful. In 1998-1999 there were the motor trade fair in Poznań, Poland, and since 2000 until today, regular participation in the world's largest Automechanika trade fair in Frankfurt am Main. In addition, travels and face-to-face meetings with the potential customers were valuable. One of the first travels was to Egypt at the invitation of Kantara Paints Company (currently KAPCI).

The company consists of the employees, whose number has grown considerably over the years. After a year of operation, the warehouse and the production were moved to Komorniki, near Poznań. The dynamic development of the company, however, required even more space and more importantly growing number of skilled employees. After several years, we leased and then we purchased the today's headquarters of the company, which is located in Luboń, near Poznań.

Change of the location involved increase in employment, new departments in the structure of the company were established, as well. The production department and the warehouse of the finished products required the largest number of the employees. Inevitably, there was also the development of the sales department. These are the most numerous departments currently. From the beginning, the laboratory has been a very important part of the company, which is responsible for high quality and development of the products.

It is worth to mention about the introduction of the ERP management system in the early years of 2002-2003, which resulted in a noticeable improvement in the organisation of the work, and forced to apply many procedures valid till these days. In 2005, the company received the quality management certificate ISO 9001:2008 and is regularly audited. Both of the above events influenced on better perception of the company and its credibility.

Another milestone in the development of the company is connection of Multichem with Automotive Art from Barbados. Strong position of AART on the American market provided us with new opportunities. Our product know-how and large experience along with the extended distribution network of our business partner caused constant increase in sales.

New opportunities for the development perfectly fit into our philosophy of operation, which is to build a strong and innovative company able to survive in the conditions of global competition, consisting of educated, hardworking, eager for success and professional employees. By understanding the needs of the customers and in order to meet them, we have the ability to create a company with a global reach, able to compete with the best players on all the world's markets.

In order to meet the expectations of the customers, we started the Mobile Learning Centre. For this reason, the painting training can take place in the desired location and time, adjusted to the participants the most. Undoubtedly, conducting training in the "natural" environment of a painter allows him/her to work more freely and assimilate the knowledge easier.

The equipment of the Mobile Centre involves the fully ventilated painting booth, the automotive paint selection system with the colour documentation.

Due to the ability of self-testing of the products by a painter, it is much easier and vividly to show the advantages of our products.

Of course, the mobile trainings are only a complement to the training offer, which we provide to our partners. We are pleased to share our many-year experience with a range of the coat paints repair in our training centre at the headquarters of the company.

A group of experienced colourists and paint technicians conduct regular painting courses, which typically lasts two to four days. The course consists of the theoretical and the practical parts. The offer is adjusted to the knowledge and the experience of the participants. We hope that this brief history of our company will help you to better understand our philosophy of operation and encourage to jointly achieve the aims, which we specified for the future.