Cooperation of Steklarna Hrastnik with Faculty of Economics, Ljubljana

From the end of February to early June the participants tackled challenges from four different project areas, namely marketing of the Speak glass, marketing of the Celzyum glass, marketing of funeral urns and segmentation of the Vitrum program. The work was done within the framework of the International Business study program under the leadership of Dr. Gregor Pfajfar and vice-rector of the Faculty of Economics Dr. Maja Makovec Brenčič as well as with the support of the Steklarne Hrastnik staff.

21 international teams of students participated in the project, since the tasks were undertaken by students from Slovenia, Canada, Great Britain, South Korea, Russia, Latin America, Portugal, Spain and the former Yugoslavia. As Steklarna Hrastnik exports 97% of its production, the students developed projects for the Japanese, Brazilian, North American and English market.

At the beginning, the students learned how the work processes in Steklarna Hrastnik take place, which technology and which raw materials are used and what is the objective of the sales activities for selected foreign markets. Their task was to find a successful way of presenting and marketing the selected products of Steklarna Hrastnik in foreign markets.

Among the 21 project tasks, the best three were selected. The winners included a project for marketing the Celzyum glass in the Brazilian market, a project for marketing the Celzyum glass on the British market, and a project for launching funeral urns on the Japanese market. All members of the winning teams received a specific recommendation of the Director General of Steklarna Hrastnik, Andrej Božič.

The practical cooperation with the renowned Slovenian company was assessed by students as very good, since they have gained valuable insight into the needs of the economy, experience and they have adopted teamwork approach to finding effective solutions to a specific problem in the market. On the other hand, Steklarna Hrastnik was given fresh solutions, which will be administered in its strategic plans. Due to the good feedback and the results of cooperation, Steklarna Hrastnik is thinking about new projects that could be implemented together with students in the future.