Whirlpool (Benton Harbor, Michigan / USA; www.whirlpool.com) is intending to spend some EUR 235m by 2018 on restructuring and modernising its household appliance plants in Poland. This commitment forms part of an investment pledge made to the Italian government in 2014 when the company acquired Indesit (see Plasteurope.com of 16.07.2014 and Plasteurope.com of 22.04.2015). EUR 500m was to be invested in the Italian competitor's production plants and research facilities. In actual fact, however, Whirlpool – which is also represented with the "Bauknecht" and "Privileg" brands in Europe – is primarily conducting a reorganisation of its own factories and the Indesit production plants in Poland, with a company spokesman reporting that there will be no expansion of production. No job cuts are planned, however, like those that resulted in Italy when a number of small plants were consolidated in a new building at the Indesit headquarters in Fabriano.

Three of Whirlpool's 43 production plants worldwide are located in Wroclaw (ovens and refrigerators), Lodz (refrigerators and mini kitchens) and Radomsko (washing machines and dishwashers). With the acquisition of its Italian competitor, the company took on additional production plants in Lodz and Radomsko. The reorganisation is aimed chiefly at concentrating refrigerator and dishwasher production on single sites, since both have been produced at two different plants to date. The Wroclaw plant will assemble refrigerators in future, while Radomsko will produce dishwashers. A development centre in Wroclaw will also be taking up work in the first quarter of 2017.

Poland holds a key position as the country that produces most of the big household appliances in Europe – and not just for the US group. Back in 2011 already, the country overtook Germany and Italy, which had been the biggest producers up until then. Alongside the biggest domestic manufacturer Amica S.A. (Wronki / Poland; www.amica.pl), which produces cookers, ovens and cooker hobs in two plants at Wronki near Poznan, other companies represented in this eastern European country are Whirlpool, Electrolux (Stockholm / Sweden; www.electrolux.com) and BSH Hausgeräte GmbH (BSH, Munich / Germany; www.bsh-group.de), each of which has a number of plants. Added to these are the Korean electronics group LG (Seoul / South Korea; www.lg.com) and Samsung (Seoul / South Korea; www.samsung.com). The latter acquired Amica's refrigerator and washing machine product lines at the end of 2009.

Whirlpool's share of sales in Europe, Africa and the Middle East (EMEA), rose clearly from 20 to 27 % in 2015 due primarily to the acquisition of Indesit. Over this same period, the North American share fell slightly from 53 to 50 %. The number of units sold increased almost twofold. Despite this, all is far from well for the US company in Europe. With overall sales of USD 20.9 bn (EUR 19.7 bn) in 2015, the household appliance manufacturer achieved profits of a good USD 4 bn in EMEA. While operating income – which is similarly showing a clear upward trend – rose to USD 414m (same period previous year 100m), this still only represents a margin of 3.7 %, making this the worst-faring region of the world for the group. The margin in North America is 11.7 %, for instance, and hence more than three times as high, while even South America and Asia rank considerably higher at 5.9 and 5.3 % respectively. The company thus has good grounds for investing in Poland.