The Delbrouck group, manufacturer of moulded, returnable packaging products, filed for insolvency on 27 April 2009. A combination of the current financial crisis and a fall in demand due to cool weather in the spring is thought to have led to the company being unable to pay its workers’ wages in full. Local media have reported that confidential negotiations with a potential investor failed. The group comprises two companies – Delbrouck (Menden / Germany; www.delbrouck.de) and Delbrouck Kunststoffverarbeitung (Neuhaus-Schierschnitz / Germany) – headed by managing partner Klaus Delbrouck. Martin Buchheister of law firm Bergfeld & Partner (Lüdenscheid / Germany; www.bergfeldonline.de) has been appointed provisional administrator.

Production of crates for breweries and producers of bottled water and transport containers for agriculture is continuing presently and orders on hand for 2009 and beyond are said to be satisfactory. The administrator says he is currently in talks with a potential investor. Klaus Delbrouck says that the aim is to maintain both facilities.

The Menden site introduced short-time working at the start of 2009. Earlier, 26 employees were dismissed as a result of the cool weather, a reduction in the use of returnable bottles and overcapacity. The two facilities currently have 140 employees.

Delbrouck appears to have been in financial difficulties for several years, in part because of the high price of its main polymer material HDPE. The management report for 2006 recorded low orders and a loss of just over EUR 400,000, principally as a result of the poor performance by the Neuhaus-Schierschnitz subsidiary. This resulted in the dismissal of 36 of the 139 employees at the Menden facility at that time. Sales were EUR 38m in 2006 but dropped to EUR 27m in 2008 and the company reported a loss, despite positive cash flow.