Amid the global economic slowdown caused by the COVID-19 crisis, Henkel Thailand remains optimistic about the opportunities in Southeast Asia?s second largest economy.
Andrianto Jayapurna, President of Henkel Thailand, said, ?The global economic slowdown caused by the COVID-19 crisis has affected overall demand in Thailand. On the other hand, Thailand has a large consumer market and growing middle class, which present opportunities in markets, such as transportation, beauty, electronics, food and beverage, and home appliances.?
?We see early signs of recovery. However, the overall situation remains to be uncertain and volatile. Our top priorities are the health and safety of employees, managing this crisis and supporting the business continuity of our customers and business partners,? he added.
For the beauty care hair market, Henkel sees the biggest potential for the hair color category, where fancy hair fashion colors are gaining popularity among the teenagers and hair color demand comes from both male and female first jobbers. Another trend is the interest in holistic hair beauty, which is driving up the demand for both professional hair salon services as well as hair care, hair treatment and hair styling at home.
Andrianto also explained about the new trends in the adhesive technologies industry. ?A megatrend is the development of next generation 5G wireless infrastructure networks. Globally, Henkel has a long history as a reliable partner to top telecom and datacom companies. Our materials are used by these companies to develop and protect various high performance, high reliability electronic devices that are critical for enabling network solutions for smart homes and smart cities.?
Additionally, digital and e-commerce sales are expected to accelerate as consumers and businesses become more digital. Henkel is actively promoting its own e-Shop and other ecommerce platform to enable customers with ease of doing business with it.
Andrianto said, ?For our beauty care hair business in Thailand, while we derived most of our sales from traditional channels, our share of online sales has been increasing steadily. For the retail business, we maintain our own Schwarzkopf retail stores in Lazada, Shopee and JD central. We have set up our traditional and online channels to complement each other and deliver a quality beauty experience for our consumers.?
Mr. Andrianto reaffirmed that Henkel Thailand continues to maintain strict COVID-19 measures in line with the regulations of the Thai government and authorities. Even before the pandemic started, Henkel Thailand has in place a Crisis Management Team to provide clear leadership and timely guidance to all its employees. ?During this uncertain period, we want our employees to be well-informed and well-prepared, and to stay calm.?
Notably, Henkel Thailand employees were able to leverage the company?s digital workplace to work remotely, stay in touch virtually with their teams and attend online meetings and trainings. also encourages employees to stay positive and develop their skills through digital learning platforms.
Andrianto added, ?During the height of the COVID-19 crisis in Thailand, all our plants continued to operate and our business teams continued to serve our customers and consumers through various virtual tools.?
For employees who are slowly returning to the workplace in phases, Henkel Thailand provides them with protective face masks, hand sanitizers, dish sponges, hand gloves and eye goggles. It continues to implement elevated health and hygiene guidelines, including mandatory temperature screening, mandatory wearing of masks, split teams, social distancing of at least 1.5 meters between colleagues, and intensified and increased cleaning and disinfecting measures. The annual medical check-ups for employees was held in the office so that employees did not need to visit the hospital.
?Henkel has been present in Thailand for almost 50 years and we are committed to continue developing our business with a clear focus on purposeful growth. This means creating superior customer and consumer value, continuously accelerating our sustainability efforts along the entire value chain, developing the skills and capabilities of our employees, and contributing to the well-being of local communities as a responsible corporate citizen,? said Andrianto.