Koh-i-noor Hardtmuth is a Czech company producing art, writing and office supplies, whose beginnings go back to 1790. It has had its main factory in České Budějovice since 1848.
Koh-i-noor Hardtmuth is a Czech company that offers art supplies, creative aids for children, office equipment and gift goods. According to its website, it was founded in 1790 by the prince's court architect Joseph Hardtmuth. The firm is based in České Budějovice, from where the whole company is run.[1]
Beginnings and the Hardtmuth family
The National Technical Museum, in a published exhibition catalogue, recalls that Joseph Hardtmuth was an architect. He designed buildings in the Lednice–Valtice Cultural Landscape, for example the minaret and the aqueduct in the Lednice Park and the Belveder near Valtice. At the same time he engaged in business and inventions, although he had not received any technical education. He devised a method of making graphite lead from lower-quality graphite, Viennese stoneware with a lead-free glaze, artificial pumice and Neapolitan yellow.[2]
His father's factory was taken over by Carl, the youngest of four brothers, who in 1848 moved it to České Budějovice because there were enough of the necessary raw materials in the surrounding area. At first he was helped by his older brother Ludwig, and for that reason the firm had been called L. & C. Hardtmuth since 1828, after their first names. Carl achieved great commercial success, and Emperor Franz Joseph I raised him to the nobility for his merits.[2]
The yellow pencil and inventions
The family business was continued by Carl's son Franz, who introduced a number of innovations with an impact on competitors and on the whole branch. In 1889 the Koh-i-noor pencil with a completely unusual yellow colour came onto the market, which quickly became a world-famous mark of quality. Franz also built the so-called Czech graphite mill, which made it possible to process hitherto unused crystalline graphite instead of amorphous graphite and to determine the hardness of the lead according to the composition of the mixture. From this came a seventeen-step hardness scale in which the designation consists of letters and numerals.[2]
The company states that important innovations in the field of writing instruments originate from its factory: a lead made of graphite and clay patented as early as 1802, the principle of machine production of pencils and the classification of graphite pencils by hardness from 8B to 10H, which other manufacturers later adopted as a world standard. In 1900 the yellow pencil 1500 received a significant award at the Paris Grand Prix.[1] In the twentieth century the family, according to the catalogue, had to cope with the end of the Habsburg monarchy, with the loss of social prestige and with national disputes over its German origin.[2]
Production and sales according to the company's website
According to the company's website, the factory in České Budějovice has been running since 1848 and still produces the most goods. Other plants are located in Městec Králové, Broumov and Milevsko, so that most of the production can be described as Czech; an exception are the markers from Bulgaria. In Czechia almost one hundred own shops are run by the subsidiary Koh-i-noor Hardtmuth Trade. The company lists foreign branches in Slovakia, Germany, Poland, Italy, Romania and Bulgaria and exports to more than ninety countries.[1]
The business no longer belongs to the descendants of the Hardtmuths. It is a private firm of the Bříza family, headed by chief executive Vlastislav Bříza Sr. Formally it belongs to the Koh-i-noor holding, which, besides consumer industry, includes healthcare, energy, the automotive industry and engineering, hospitality and real estate.[1]
Owners in more recent times
Hospodářské noviny reports that Vlastislav Bříza joined Koh-i-noor in the days of socialism as a designer. From 1994 he ran the plant for the entrepreneur Petr Kellner and in 2000 bought it from him. According to the paper, the group, besides the pencil factory, included the production of medical supplies, the distribution of fuels and a toolmaking division, and it also owned several South Bohemian hotels. The family concentrated on developing the engineering part, where it acquired the firms Ponas and Ronas and, according to the paper, the Brno-based Formex was added. Bříza won the Entrepreneur of the Year competition, organised by the company Ernst & Young, in 2014.[3]