Mangalore: The rebuilt Mangalore facility of Primacy Industries Ltd., the world’s largest candle manufacturer, will be inaugurated on Wednesday, January 15 at 5 pm by N R Narayan Murthy, Executive Chairman of Infosys.
M Narendra, Chairman and MD of Indian Overseas Bank will be the Guest of Honour.
Announcing this at a well attended press conference held at the Mangalore Press Club today, V K Thalithaya, President, Primacy expressed delight that the factory and office premises that was completely destroyed by a devastating fire on January 10, 2013 is now back with full scale operations. Primacy had already commenced production in June 2013 living up to the commitment the company had made to stakeholders and society at large.
The global entity Primacy MVP International Group is in the business of home fragrance and has three factories in the United States of America besides Indian operations from Gandhidham (Gujarat) and Mangalore.
The Mangalore unit of Primacy MVP International Group which was established in January 2005 has been manufacturing and exporting fragrant Pillars, Jars and Tin candles to large retail chains in USA, UK, Ireland, Germany, Australia and the Gulf. Primacy is a constituent business of the diversified Manipal Group which leads in printing and packaging, publishing, media and other industry segments.
Prior to the fire accident, Primacy was exporting from Mangalore approximately 900 shipping containers per annum which is equivalent to 22,000 tons of finished goods. The rebuilt facility has capacity to produce over 600 containers (15,000 tons) which will be scaled up to 1,000 containers as the demand builds up.
T. Gautham Pai, Chairman, Primacy expressed his appreciation for the Management Team and Employees who stood by the organization all through the difficult times and helped in rebuilding ground up at the shortest possible time. At the time of the fire accident Primacy which is also amongst the largest employers in Dakshina Kannada employed 1,140 people of whom only 185 resigned and all the rest have been taken back.
Replying to reporters on the extent of loss the company suffered as a consequence of the fire, V K Talithaya said the investment made in 2005 to build the factory was Rs 11.50 crores. On the new factory the company has already spend close Rs 22 crores all which has been funded through owner’s equity and bank loans since the insurance claim is yet to be realized. Besides, soon after the fire the company had to shift production to its factories in the US to meet customer commitments and incurred very high cost.
Primacy is expanding its business portfolio and has recently forayed into Aerosol packed Room fresheners from another unit at Mangalore having production capacity for three crore units per annum.
Sagar Mukhopadhyay, vice-president (Corporate Affairs) and Alok Lahoti, CEO of Primacy Industries Ltd were present among others in the press meet.
