100 years | Company - Hörby Bruk

100 years of quality, function and design

This year, Hörby Bruk is celebrating its 100-year anniversary. Consequently, a century has passed since operations started in Birger Eriksson’s factory in Ekeby outside of Helsingborg in southern Sweden. A lot has happened during all the years that have passed and naturally the company’s activities are completely different today. The wheelbarrow was the product that was developed quickly and introduced into the company. It was displayed in an exhibition in Landskrona as early as in 1926. When the company moved to Hörby in the 1930s, our wheelbarrow was our main product. Today, Hörby Bruk is the largest manufacturer of wheelbarrows in the Nordic countries and a market leader in Sweden. Over the years, millions of wheelbarrows have been manufactured in Hörby, while our range of products has grown. Today, we sell hundreds of different products in Sweden, the Nordic countries and across Europe. In addition to the wheelbarrow, we also produce sack barrows and steel swings in large volumes. Since the 1960s, lots of children have grown up with a classic CanCan swing in their garden. Others have had their first summer job at some kind of warehouse and have probably come into contact with our different barrows.

Today, Hörby Bruk is a modern Swedish industrial company.

We are blending the genuine craftsmanship of our skilled employees with automation and modern production processes. We are very proud of being able to put “Made in Sweden” on our products. This is our hallmark and will continue to be so. In recent years, we have invested heavily in production at Hörby. As an example, we can mention an automatic pipe cutter, a fully automated press line and a new installation for powder coating. This is to safeguard the manufacture of quality products in Sweden in the years to come.

At Hörby Bruk we rest secure in our core values. Everybody is welcome here and we defend the equal rights and values of everybody. In many ways, we are a company with a societal engagement where, among other things, education and training issues are high on the agenda. One of the prerequisites for future production in Sweden is the availability of the necessary skills. For this reason, it is important that the industry is engaged in this, and Hörby Bruk has been a partner of Teknikcollege, an education platform for technology-oriented courses, for a long time. Naturally, we are very proud of our business. When we put the last 100 years behind us and look forward to the next phase, we do this with great confidence and optimism.
Göran Sjöberg, CEO

Natures Collection – inspiration from nature

In order to highlight Hörby Bruk’s 100-year jubilee, an entirely new colour collection has been produced for one of our most popular wheelbarrows – the 90-litre Ekeby model. Naturally, we have kept the classic green colour and also some of the other more colourful, intense and popular colours. The new collection, however, is something entirely different. “The colours of the Jubilee Year follow the soft colour scale of nature itself where Swedish flora has inspired us,” says Carina. “Environmental and sustainability issues are high on the agenda today, something we are naturally happy about since we know that our products are regarded as being produced locally and sustainably. Subsequently, including nature’s own colours in our product range feels completely natural to us,” she continues. The new names are Cikoria, which is a traditional cultivated plant that grows in meadows, and the blue flower is both beautiful and edible, Water Avens, which is a small, sweet, hardy plant with its nodding flowers and Lady’s Mantle, a medicinal plant that beautifully covers the ground with its green folded and cupped rosette leaves.

Our history

1920 The Smithy started in Ekeby outside of Helsingborg by Nils Birger Eriksson where mostly repairs of agricultural machines were carried out.

1926 The first sheet metal wheelbarrow was manufactured by cutting, bending and riveting the sheet metal together. The Ekeby wheelbarrow was created and premiered at the Landskrona Exhibition in 1926. A new, fully welded wheel that was extra strong and smooth with a lubrication device was patented.

1936 The entire business was moved to the existing premises in Hörby. The facade in Hörby already sported the name “HÖRBY BRUKS AKTIEBOLAG”, which made it easy to change to this company name in conjunction with the move to Hörby.

1937 The innovation for the year: The Ekeby wheelbarrow can now also be delivered with a pneumatic rubber wheel.

1939 The Second World War is a fact and goods are being rationed; many men were drafted for emergency service and vehicles were enrolled by the state for use by the Armed Forces. That is what happened with the recently procured lorry. As a replacement for this, a four-wheel hand-drawn transport wagon for transports to the railroad station was manufactured. This wagon then became a new product in our product range. Later, even an electrically powered car that was easier to drive was also developed.

1950 The Bergengren family buy Hörby Bruk

1962 Lennart Book is CEO from 1962 until 1989 leading Hörby Bruk forward under a period of strong expansion.

1965 Our play product range is introduced via the release of the ‘Kvartettgungan’ (Quartet Swing) onto the market and it soon became a success. After a downturn in the market during the 1980s, the swing was revamped to a lighter but equally stable model and given the name CanCan.

1966 Investments are made in a hydraulic press for deep-drawing of wheelbarrow baskets. This is one of the largest individual machine investments. The baskets could now be pressed in one piece entirely without joints.
Work phases were reduced to drawing, trimming and edge rolling. Annual production can now be achieved in 3 months instead.

1967 The railroad station in Hörby is decommissioned, and Hörby Bruk starts to transport goods by lorries instead. When the railroad existed, entire railroad wagons were loaded with goods to major customers.

1968 A new paint shop consisting of trichlor degreasing, dipping vats with paint and an oil-fired kiln are acquired. An automatic line means that manual handling only involves loading and unloading. Each of the dipping vats hold 3 m³ of paint and must be full to work; for this reason, it was not possible to change colours.

1977 The paint shop is upgraded with a powder paint box parallel to the dipping vats.

1987 Production is modified with welding robots

1991 A new powder paint plant is being installed in the paint shop resulting in big improvements with regards to both the working environment and an improvement in quality. This is the largest investment so far at a cost of SEK 6 million.

1997 Hörby Bruk purchases Fogelsta, the largest competitor in Sweden

2002 Hörby Bruk is quality assured in accordance with ISO 9001. Since the trademark is based on quality, certification was considered to be a natural step.

2003 The manufacture of components is started in China in order to be able to offer a full-scale range of different price levels. Today we offer the Basic Line as a propriety product range and a supplement to our Swedish-manufactured premium products.

2006 A new warehouse is built because the new products from the Far East need a bigger storage area.

2011 Hörby Bruk is environmentally certified according to ISO 14001. There have been many questions from customers and suppliers regarding the control of waste management and other environmental issues.

2013 A CSR project is started in order to achieve greater overall responsibility when it comes to both internal and external stakeholders. A Code of Conduct is introduced for our suppliers in order to guarantee a good working environment.

2016 As a complement to our product range for professionals we have expanded our product flora with garden tools.

2017 Hörby Bruk makes one of its largest investments and installs a fully automated press line for baskets for wheelbarrows. This was to guarantee continued manufacture in Hörby.

2019 A new warehouse is built to provide a larger storage area. The paint shop’s powder coating installation is being upgraded with a new colour box that is more environmentally friendly. Now a colour change only takes 10 minutes compared to 3.5 hours before!

2020 Hörby Bruk 100 years

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