Contract Textile International

Teksko, Number One Trevira Cs User in Turkey

Company News - Volume 6 / Sep-Dec 2011

* Abuzer Tanriverdi, General Manager of Teksko:

“Know-how, talent and quality are all at Teksko”

By making high-tech investments at the level of international quality Teksko Company is a leading manufacturer of velvet, curtain fabrics and furnishing fabrics. The company continues to supply the best products to its customers thanks to its experience and know-how accumulated over the years. Exporting to 50 countries today, Teksko is operating in its facilities in a covered area of thirteen thousand square meters where 120 experts are working to produce two hundred thousand meters of fabric monthly. We conducted an exclusive interview with Mr. Abuzer Tanriverdi, General Manager to Teksko about their today and future and their targets. Full text of the interview follows:

When was Teksko established? What is your story?

Our company started to produce fabrics in 1980. First, we started to produce furnishing fabrics for the domestic market, later started to produce for the Russian market, as well as for the Middle Eastern markets by supplying prayer rugs for them. Russian crisis led us to furnishing and curtaining velvet fabric production again. We decided to invest at this direction. We tended to right targets at the right time and our initiations yielded very good results placing us among the most respectful companies in velvet in the world.

Can you furnish us about your product range and capacity?

We already have almost 200 thousand meters of tulle production making two and a half million annually. We have also decided to enter bus chair furnishing business for the automotive sector. So, we will be producing velvet fabrics to the automotive industry, too, in addition to the home textile, furniture and curtaining sectors.

Another feature of our company is to be able to produce velvet from every kind of fiber yarn. We are realizing velvet fabric production by using 60 types of fibers from natural to synthetic. Especially in Trevira CS, Teksko is the company that is using most CS (plain and jacquard) in Turkey. Besides, we produce velvet from 100% FR yarn complying all European sensitivity tests. We have the facilities to meet all kinds of requirements. Any order we ship to Europe is delivered the next day and this is very much appreciated by our customers. None of European or other nations’ furniture manufacturers wants to keep stock. For this reason we obtain information about when they need the fabric beforehand and we keep stock for them. We make this for the sake of customer satisfaction to the extent of extra cost.

What about your export potential? What percentage of your products is exported?

We export 80% of our products and remaining balance goes to the domestic market. We export to 52 countries mainly in Europe. While producing 200 thousand meters of fabrics our goal is not get hit by global crisis by widening country and customer portfolio. The exclusive and major target of Teksko is “to be the supplier sought after by world editors.

Where do you stand in domestic market?

We are selling to few companies which have become respectful brands operating in Turkey. In addition, you can see Teksko velvet in many hotel projects.

What are the main specialties differentiating Teksko from its competitors?

Our major specialties are the features such as long experience, know-how, talent, love to our work, professional team, a wide vision, investments on R & D, following up technology closely, being capable to produce all kinds of natural fibers, participating in all fairs in the sector in the world and developing the best products for those fairs, and delivering in time. Our biggest textile export market is Italy. China, which is a nightmare for many textile companies, ranks fourth among 52 countries that we export to. This, in fact, proves how meaningless the China fear is. For, the population of China is around 1.5 billion. The elite class, which constitutes 10% of the total, is about 150 million. This number represents two folds of Turkey’s total and they have excellent consuming capacity. So, we realize a great part of our exports to China. This could not be very wise for the home textile but for velvet, it is a fact.

How do you evaluate the current and future position of the sector?

When you say home textile, it applies to a wide area. Competing with China is more difficult in tulle business than in velvet. Despite this fact, our position is weaker against China in plain knitting. But we have the capacity of competition with all countries of the world as we have the heavy industry of the textile sector. If a producer is using his product in the decoration of his own house comfortable, that product sells all over the world. If you plan and act for the long run you earn both money and stability. When you provide these, you will not be affected by the global crisis the world is going through.

What are your targets and projects for the long and medium terms?

We should first underline this; too much production doesn’t mean too much profit. We aim to hold our production at certain level and maintain permanent customers in 52 countries which we are exporting to. We haven’t made investments after the crisis broke out in 2009 as many other companies did. Instead, we preferred to increase the quantity of our production and we became successful. Besides, we want ta get a share from the automotive industry, too. So, we will meet the needs of our customers’ demands and we will continue necessary investments. Stability makes more sense for us than profit margin.

Anything you would like to add?

I believe that the support of our government for the producers should increase. We are employing about 120 workers now and we never fired people during crisis times. So, the government should support and encourage producing and exporting companies. There many yarn manufacturers in Turkey. I am against importing yarns. If a product is available in Turkey, I prefer paying one dollar more and get better quality and faster service. I think imposing quota over raw materials would be advisable for the sake of supporting producers. If our companies do this, their exports will increase and they will not experience quality problem in any part of the world. In other countries, yarn producers are gathered under one roof and they determine the prices together. But in our country, producers are not organized under one roof and this causes many problems. To overcome this, the sector representatives should get organized under the leadership of our government.