Less than 20 kilometres away from Bucharest, on former arable land, 30 trucks displaying the logo "My fine yoghurt" and "My Sana" leave the dairy facilities of the Tnuva Israeli group every day; providing direct distribution to stores in the capital city, Timisoara and Cluj.
The Israeli dairy producer initially bet 55m euros on the Romanian market at a time when another two major European companies in the industry, Meggle and Lactalis, chose not to operate greenfield investments in Romania.
Around 230 people work at the plant in Popesti-Leordeni, which is located on a 17,000-square metre site. The Israelis recruited staff from across the country, with the number of employees expected to rise to 300 by the yearend.
According to Cristina Vasilescu, a HR manager with the company, the personnel were recruited either through job websites or newspaper ads. However, the plant's first employees, who are currently in management positions, arrived in Romania several years ago.
Out of the 230 employees working at the company, 25% are members of the management team and are mainly Romanian.
All of the other employees were hired after the HR manager implemented some strict requirements. "First we established the company's values and then started looking for people who could match these values, who had experience in the respective positions," said Cristina Vasilescu.
Up to a point, the investment of the Israeli group in Romania follows the trajectory drawn-up in 1998 by the French group Danone, one of the company's main rivals on the segment of yoghurts. In both cases, the investment was initiated via a partnership with the EBRD, whilst neither involved acquisitions. Instead however, while Danone entered the market at a time when yoghurt consumption was below one kilo per capita and the market was, as yet, unshaped, Tnuva arrived on the market at
