Q&A with Cornelius - Cornelius Polska Sp. z oo

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Q&A with Cornelius
We asked Cornelius marketing manager Natalia McDonagh a
few more questions about the company and its strategy, with the
emphasis on personal care
Who are your principals in the UK?
Cornelius is the sole distributor in the
UK for some of the world’s largest
chemicals companies. Our principals
in the UK are, in alphabetical order:
BASF, Guangzhou Tinci, JEEN
International, JM Huber Engineered
Materials, Lonza Biologics, Phoenix
Chemicals, Precolor, Radiant Color,
RITA, Silab, Shangdong Longlive,
Strahl & Pitsch, and Teluca.
Our product portfolio covers all of
the personal care market applications,
including unique technical materials
and competitive commodity-type
products. We are proud of the strong
working relationships with our global
principals. This allows us to offer
ingredients for all business needs, as
well as to ensure continuity and
security of supply- something which
we recognise as one of the key
requirements in the today's market.
How has business been this year, in
personal care and any other fields you
are active in?
Last year in general was exceptional
for us - and SCS Formulate in Coventry
last November was a great platform
for us to showcase our latest
innovative solutions under the
Cornelius Complete Solutions concept.
New multifunctional actives from Silab
providing proven efficacy combined
with value for money have been one of
the most popular ranges, while the
new range of UV-filters from BASF,
such as Tinosorb S Aqua, offers a
number of benefits to formulators.
The new BASF Sunscreen
Simulator, an online tool for
formulators, is an example of our
value-added offer, helping the
formulator planning the composition
of active ingredient in a sunscreen
formulation. In addition, our complete
natural and organic range of
ingredients have been a real hit with
the customers, as we offer an
extensive range of Ecocert, Natrue and
the Soil Association products for any
personal care applications, such as
pearlescent pigments, dental silicas,
actives, emulsifiers, surfactants, oils,
waxes, preservatives and many more.
Alongside the cosmetics and
personal care business unit, we area
also active in our industrial,
pharmaceuticals, health and food
markets, in the UK, Ireland, Poland
and France. For example, after
establishing our Polish personal care
branch Cornelius Polska, we have now
diversified into the vibrant food and
pharmaceutical markets, which we
think will grow significantly in the next
year.
Products for our pharmaceutical
and our health and food portfolios are
selected via a very focused approach
that is based on innovation, quality,
safety and functional benefits. We
constantly scan the market for new
product development (NPD)
opportunities, and identify the ways we
can help both our customers and
principals develop their business.
For example, the latest launches
from our principals address the
current market trends, such as: weight
management (such as Slendesta,
Kemin’s patented potato-derived
satiety ingredient, sports and energy
(AlzChem’s well known Creapure
brand of creatine) and Hayashibara’s
Treha Trehalose an innovative
carbohydrate with unique properties
that helps aid in new development,
cost reduction and problem solving in
both food and pharma products.
A lot of products are tested by the
Cornelius staff. For example, the
principal development manager for
our industrial team cited his success
in completing the London Marathon in
2010 as largely due to taking Creapure
during his training! Further new
developments include Acatris, which
can help convert products such as
gelatin desserts to gelatine-free, and
Cafosa gum granules that can be used
on conventional tablet making
equipment to manufacture chewing
gum.
McDonagh – Smaller
size gives us flexibility
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Cornelius Group
Do you regard yourselves essentially
as distributors or do you offer valueadded
services in terms of technology
to your principals? Can you give some
examples of projects you have been
involved in?
I am confident our principals will
agree that we are much more than just
a distributor. We work on the basis of
open communication on market and
cross-industry developments and
opportunities.
For example, we have coordinated
the pioneering project between Lonza
and the Soil Association in the UK
exploring and developing the scheme
for an approved list of materials which
would be accessible to formulators
and developers. This scheme makes it
possible to speed up and simplify the
selection of materials for products to
be certified to the Soil Association
standards. The newly approved range
includes preservatives, polyglycerol
esters and natural multifunctional
ingredients.
As a principal’s representative in
the UK and other operational markets,
it is our job to ensure the active
promotion of their latest launches to
the industry players. Our IT, marketing
and sales teams constantly develop
innovative concepts for the
promotional campaigns. Furthermore,
the Cornelius Technical Centre
possesses regulatory expertise which
is an undoubted value-added to our
principals, especially non-EU based.
Our active role with the CBA, FECC
and various industry trade
associations ensure both the
representation of principals' views and
regular updates on the latest
developments in the markets. The raft
of legislation that has hit the industry
in recent years, has created a huge
volume of work and cost for the
industry. However, CBA has been
excellent in providing very strong
support for its member organisations,
to ensure that the sector meets all the
legislative requirements and can face
a strong and sustainable future.
We are constantly hearing of big
companies like Azelis and Univar
acquiring small distributors and
rebranding them. Is it becoming
harder for smaller companies to
compete in this market?
As a smaller but established, trusted
and fast-growing company, we are in a
position to quickly react both to the
general market trends and -
somewhat more importantly - to our
customers’ needs. Quick decision
making, flexibility, and approachable
and personable teams are all part of
our culture and something that many
of our customers have positively
commented on. Our strength is our
ability to quickly communicate
customer feedback to our suppliers,
ensuring full supply chain continuity
and working on unique technical
projects using our principals’ expertise
and the resources of the Cornelius
Technical Centre.
Our aim is to facilitate the
knowledge transfer between raw
materials suppliers and our
customers, the end product
manufacturers. We regularly organise
technical presentations and
workshops where we invite the
industry experts to deliver
presentations and practical advice on
any formulation challenges. We also
hold regular technical seminars, giving
our customers the chance to network
with international industry colleagues,
catch the latest news, research and
views on sourcing, identifying and
using natural materials.
Our principals recognise the
importance of such networking and
educational events and always support
us with these initiatives, which
ensures high brand awareness for
Cornelius in our operational markets.
It is a great opportunity to network
directly with the end product global
manufacturers and to discuss ideas for
NPD using our expertise and that of
our suppliers.
As a result of the teamwork
between ourselves and our principals,
innovative products and solutions are
constantly being developed to help the
companies with formulatory,
legislative and other challenges. For
example, our industrial additives
partner, Elementis Specialities, has
optimised a selected combination of
Rheolate rheology modifiers,
Nuosperse wetting and dispersing
agents and Dapro defoamers
specifically to give improved
performance in high gloss, waterbased
alkyd paints.
The Solaplex range of bright yellow
and orange pigments from Rockwood
Pigments has been developed
specifically to replace old-technology
pigments that contain lead and
chrome, to answer the challenges of
our customers who work to standards
being imposed by new and
forthcoming legislation. Tronox, a top
five global producer of titanium
dioxide, continues to develop and
optimise processing, gloss and opacity
properties of their products for use in
coatings systems and plastics
applications. Their brilliant white
pigments have contributed to the
success of many internationally known
brands.
How do you see the personal care
distribution market evolving in the next
couple of years and what are you doing
to address that?
We are seeing increasing number of
end product manufacturers looking to
reduce the number of their suppliers.
We have been successfully working
with a number of multinational
corporations as a pan-European
supplier, which allows then to achieve
significant cost and time saving. As a
‘full basket’ distributor, with a global
sourcing office with speciality and
commodity capabilities and excellent
logistical support systems, our
ultimate goal is assisting to shorten
product development cycle.
The full supply chain continuity and
assurance of quality is an important
issue in the market today: our
stringent systems (for example,
comprehensive and unbiased auditing
of all of our suppliers, full batch
traceability) and our commitment to
CSR gives our customers peace of
mind. We are delighted that our
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principals across all business sectors
work closely with us on developing
environmentally responsible solutions,
as the growing focus on sustainability
is giving rise to innovation at all stages
in the supply chain.
I am really struggling with what to
pick as just one example of the vast
portfolio of innovations developed by
our principals that we were able to
bring to the market but one is
Jeesperse CPW (standing for Cold
Process Wax), a patent-pending
cosmetics wax/gallant-optimised
powder which allows ‘green’
formulations. This series offers
sustainable carbon footprint reduction
by allowing single kettle production by
a cold process.
Cornelius has expanded into Poland.
Why did you target this particular
market and how are you addressing it?
It has in fact now been over three
years since the beginning of our
operations in Poland and it is going
very well. A number of our customers
have put their manufacturing into
Eastern Europe, and our
environmental scanning unveiled huge
opportunities in this market. We
started by identifying the market
potential, formulated strong product
portfolio to address market needs,
employed an experienced team with
extensive local market knowledge and
organised logistics and customer
service, adopting a flexible approach to
every problem.
In January 2011, Cornelius Polska
was officially established as a
Cornelius Group subsidiary in Poland.
This will allow us to leverage our
operational capabilities further across
the business groups, to continue
delivering excellent sales and to
support service and achieve synergy
across our supply chain. We owe our
success to the exceptional teamwork
of our teams in the UK and Poland and
our sourcing offices in China and India,
plus the continuous support of our
principals.
Cornelius Polska remains the
platform for future operations in
Central and Eastern Europe,
supporting planned growth in the
region. Our market entry plans outside
the UK ensure that Cornelius remains
a vibrant and exciting company to work
for and to work with it. We are
consistently looking for new
opportunities and are broadening our
horizons with regards to new
geographical markets and have
recently entered the French cosmetics
and food markets, with an industrial
business unit also being developed.
For more information, please
contact:
Natalia McDonagh
Marketing Manager
Cornelius Group
Woodside
Bishop’s Stortford
Hertfordshire
CM23 5RG
UK
Tel: +44 1279 714319
E-mail:
natalia.mcdonagh@cornelius.co.uk
Website: www.cornelius.co.uk
Cornelius’s Technical Centre prepares demonstration samples and offers formulation support
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