Leading supplier of Graphic films, Reflective materials and Adhesive tapes, Orafol Australia has revealed that the owner and CEO of Orafol worldwide, Dr Holger Loclair, on January 15th was awarded Hall of Fame, Family Business status by a jury representing Germany’s leading business newspaper, Handelsblatt.
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| Orafol's Dr Holger Loclair inside the Orienberg, Gemany factory. |
Now in its twelfth year, these awards, held in Munich, seek to recognise and honour German family businesses who have shown exceptional entrepreneurial drive.
Orafol Australia Managing Director Alex McClelland says: “It may come as a surprise that, despite its size, Orafol is a family company that emerged from the former GDR (East German) state ownership as VEB Spezialfarben Oranienburg, following the reunification of Germany. It was privatized as Orafol in 1991. Holger has been with the organisation for a very long time, originally in R&D when paints and varnishes were its main products. His wife, daughter and son either work or have worked with Orafol and the family spirit, driven by Holger’s ambition and entrepreneurship, permeates the whole global organisation.”
Today, Orafol employs over 1,800 people and itsproducts can be found in motorway signs, buildings, racing car wraps, construction site safety markings, reflective license plate foils and also light-conducting elements for sensors and displays, special foils for passports, adhesive tapes for flexographic plate mounting and much more. 
Family-run businesses are, according to Stefan Heidbreder, managing director of the Family Business Foundation: “The arteries of the economy.” Approximately 90% of German businesses are family-run and some can trace their origins back to the sixteenth century.
Orafol’s origins go back to Berlin in 1808, as a paint workshop. After the First World War the company moved from Berlin to Oranienburg, where it remains to this day.
As a youth in the GDR, Dr Holger Loclair stood out as an excellent gymnast with Olympic potential, but in 1968 turned to academia with a particular interest in chemistry and mathematics, completing his studies in 1976. In 1977 he joined VEB Spezialfarben Oranienburg in 1977, thus having a 43-year association with what we now know as Orafol. The competitive disciplines learned in the gymnasiums have been a major factor in his entrepreneurial drive.
Loclair visited Australia towards the end of last year and, as McClelland notes: “Ambition and entrepreneurship are still very much encouraged. We are rebuilding Orafol Australia with this in mind, and have some exciting announcements coming up. I offer my congratulations to Holger on the deserved recognition from Handelsblatt, for taking a state-run enterprise and turning into one of the world’s leading suppliers to the sign, display and safety industries.”
