BAARLE NASSAU, Netherlands, ECHIROLLES, France: Sudlac SAS and Mardenkro BV, two companies that produce innovative greenhouse coatings, are moving forward under a new name. The new company name is Lumiforte®. Lumiforte is part of the Horticoop Cooperative. Lumiforte coatings will continue to be available to customers under the brand names Sudlac, ReduSystems, and Selectline.
“In the process of the name change, various business activities are also being further optimised, including production, logistics and marketing. This benefits our customers,” explains Guido Janssen, CEO Lumiforte.
Lumiforte will retain the tried and trusted Sudlac and ReduSystems brand names in horticulture. Janssen: “After all, these brand names are solidly anchored in the market and they each have their own specific properties and market approach. Customers can choose exactly the product that best suits their business, climate and crop.”
The coatings available under the Sudlac brand name provide the crop with maximum and effective protection against the sunlight for shorter or longer periods of time, as needed. The self-cleaning coatings do not require a removal agent.
The technologically high-quality ReduSystems coatings work with greater precision and focus. These coatings control the amount of light and heat. The ReduSystems products can be combined, and they supplement each other. For example, in summer, light and heat-reflecting coatings can be applied to the greenhouse cover together with a diffuse coating, while in low-light periods a coating can be used that increases the light level.
In the sports sector, Lumiforte operates as a producer of sports line marking products and machinery under the brand name Selectline, offering a complete range of ready-to-use coatings and coating concentrates that stand out in terms of whiteness and wear resistance. By now a well-known name for many European sports stadiums and associations.
Local services and delivery
Lumiforte will continue to work with its reliable global network of distributors and wholesalers so that products will always be locally available for the users, says CEO Janssen. Customers in Northern Europe can contact the Dutch Lumiforte branch for their orders and questions. Customers in Southern Europe are serviced by the French branch and American customers are serviced from the branch in Canada. A Lumiforte Asia subdivision is under development and follows in 2022.
The renovated production facility in France
Lumiforte notes that the demand for quality shading agents continues to increase due to global greenhouse growth. Therefore, Lumiforte France opened a brand-new plant in 2021. In Southern Europe, shading agents are primarily used to increase crop efficiency. Lumiforte is observing a different trend in Northern Europe: there is a strong growing need here to control light throughout the entire year by means of coatings.
Company history
The French company Sudlac started operations in 1959 in Grenoble with the production of wall paint. In 1978, Sudlac halts the production of paint made with petroleum-based solvents and starts focusing on water-based products.
A year later, a local grower asks Sudlac whether it has any products designed to remove whitewash from greenhouse covers. In response to this request, the company develops Varionet and Sudlac starts producing its first shading agent. In 1995, the shading agent Serra l’Ombre is introduced to the market. This product is later replaced by the Eclipse F-Series and, in addition, new, removable shading agents are also developed such as Eclipse LD, Transpar and the Topclear cleaning agent.
In 1986, Martin Kroeze founds the company Mardenkro in Baarle-Nassau in the Netherlands. In 1991, Mardenkro introduces ReduSol to the market. In the Netherlands, and quickly also in the rest of the world, this shading agent became very popular in the greenhouse cultivation sector as a replacement for the generally used whitewash.
A few years later Mardenkro introduces ReduSol Xtra and the cleaning agent ReduClean. Today, ReduSol is sold in more than 65 countries.
In 2004, Mardenkro introduces ReduHeat. This product was a breakthrough for the greenhouse cultivation sector. ReduHeat’s innovative aspect is that it blocks infrared light, and this way prevents crops from becoming sunburned, while the coating allows PAR grow-light to pass through. ReduHeat wins the Innovation Award at the Horti Fair in Amsterdam.
In the following years, Mardenkro devotes a great deal of attention to the development of new coatings for specific purposes. In 2011, ReduFuse is introduced to the market. This coating diffuses incident light, which results in higher crop production and better crop quality. ReduFuse is perfectly suitable for application to covered vegetable crops. ReduFuse is a winner of the Horti Fair Innovation Award.
