The largest Hungarian chestnut processor burned to the ground in March, but is now producing again

“If we had not been ready by October, it is not certain that we would have ever been able to restart production, because despite all their loyalty, neither the employees nor the suppliers could have waited a year to continue”

‒ Károly Egyed, founder and CEO of Sarkpont Zrt., looked back on the recent past.

“However, we were able to keep all our employees, many of whom helped with the reconstruction for months in social work, for which we cannot be grateful enough. It is important that after the demolition of the old building, not only the building but also the entire technology had to be rebuilt, by October and with a closed trial operation, to be ready for the arrival of the trucks.”

The manager pointed out that all this required exemplary cooperation: “Not only did the employees remain loyal to the company – Sarkpont is one of the largest employers in the area – but several private individuals also supported the restart with significant donations. Both the technology suppliers and the construction company treated our requests with high priority and trusted us. Representatives of the chestnut producing partners from Italy, Portugal and several parts of the Balkans personally visited the plant under construction and assured their support, but the partners and customers in the retail and HORECA sectors also remained loyal and “waited” for us. Without this, we would almost certainly not have been able to get back on our feet and overcome the difficulties.”

And there were plenty of difficulties. Their former bank backed out of the company immediately after the fire, and the new machine line, which was financed from the tender but destroyed before the handover, had to be rebuilt – now without financing. The weather didn’t help either. The heat meant that the chestnuts ripened earlier, and the first shipment arrived on October 8, about 2 weeks earlier than expected, so everything had to be ready by then.

Despite all this, the Somogy County plant will process more chestnuts this year than at any time since its founding in 1993. Their wide range of products is available and popular in Croatia, and they have opened a successful brand store in Portugal. They even had the energy to enter the market with four new products. market.

“We tried to maintain our characteristic, almost continuous product development during the reconstruction, so we can celebrate the rebirth in style, with five new, frozen products; two cakes, a pie and two chestnut rolls, showing the world that we are alive, working and that we have succeeded”

‒ concluded Károly Egyed.