Kiefel Driving Sustainability
Tremendous changes are shaping our world: Climate change and environmental pollution have a significant impact on our society.
As a thermoforming and joining technology company, we are therefore taking an active role in helping to shape a better future for us all by fully exploiting sustainability potential and achieving an increase in efficiency.
Our mission & vision
Our mission is to drive sustainability holistically in our corporate DNA. In practice, this means that we constantly question our actions and improve them step by step.
Our vision: We are the leading solution provider for the
development and implementation of the most sustainable technology.
Our objectives
We rethink materials, products, processes, and machines with the aims of developing the best as well as the most sustainable solution for the respective application - in the medical field, the refrigerator or packaging industry – and optimizing resource-saving technologies & processes.
With investments in our own technology and Material Center, research activities and cooperations, we go the extra mile and support our customers as experts in close partnership on the way to more sustainable solutions.
Yes, we care
Brueckner Group’s initiative for proactive action as an innovation leader
Being sustainable is a great responsibility and requires great commitment to achieve sustainable development goals. Incorporating sustainability into its DNA, Brückner Group acknowledges sustainability fundamental to the way it runs its business.
In transition to a low-carbon and sustainable economy, we constantly evaluate the impacts of our activities and are committed to align those actions based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
As a manufacturer of plastics processing machines and services, the Brückner Group has taken the responsibility for making its products more sustainable and to make sure that the products manufactured on our products do not harm the environment.
The key dimensions of our sustainable performance are:
- Company: technological competence, know-how, high quality in machinery for plastics
- Products: more sustainable products, alternative materials production, and processing
- Environment: energy-efficient operations, reduced carbon emissions and careful use of resources, waste management, water, and biodiversity protection
- People: Fair and attractive working conditions
Sustainability at Kiefel
Rethinking your Product
Give us your product - we will make it sustainable
Your product comes first for us: We rethink product design and functionality, materials and composition with a view to a more sustainable product. Depending on this, we adapt manufacturing processes and optimize machines and tools for your production.
You can choose and use classic, recyclable plastics such as rPET, bio-based materials such as PLA or natural fibers - Kiefel has the machine solution. Your sustainable product can thus more easily be recycled and returned to the circular economy, be biodegradable or even compostable.
This choice is more important than ever as the end-user drive for sustainable and green packaging is greater than ever. Kiefel offers you tomorrow's solutions today.
Material Center
We offer services from our material centers for all business areas from Medical, Packaging and Appliance.
Our Packaging Material R&D Center - specializing in natural fibers - and the Applied Polymer Research Center - focusing on recycled and bio-based plastics - are starting points for our customers' product developments.
Technology Center
Our Medical, Packaging and Appliance Technology Centers have various types of machines for plastics processing and for the production of samples and prototypes.
In the packaging sector, machine types for processing natural fibers are available.
Commitment & Social
Yes, We Care
"Reduce - Reuse - Recyle" should not remain a buzzword for us, but be filled with life.
As a technology and market leader in the most diverse areas of the plastics and packaging industry, we have the opportunity to contribute our vision of the future and our engineering spirit for more sustainability.
#Kiefeleducates
On the way to more sustainability, the exchange with others is very important. In presentations at schools or as part of university excursions, we can pass on our experience, educate people about the use of different materials such as plastics or natural fibers, and present forward-looking technologies. At the same time, we can benefit from the feedback and jointly find future-oriented solutions, e.g. within research cooperations with universities.
Visit of the FH Salzburg | Visit by students of the continuing education module "Circular Economy" of the Salzburg University of Applied Sciences: During a company tour, they were able to learn more about our commitment to a functioning circular economy and experience fiber thermoforming in our new technology center.
Lecture at an elementary school | Early practice - at a local elementary school, we were able to educate the children about the entire circular economy (production, use and recycling) of plastics and fiber products as well as the various areas of application.
#Kiefelsupports
Doctors and nursing staff in clinics, in retirement and nursing homes, outpatient nursing services, medical practices, psychologists, physiotherapists, schools and children's homes, the city administration and many more have thanked us for donating our face shields.
Excellent Training Organization
Young talents - very big - as a recognized IHK training company and for the strong performance of our trainees, we again received the award of the IHK. The seal stands for quality and excellent training.
ASASE Foundation
ASASE has an impressive comprehensive approach: Women collect plastic waste in and around Ghana’s capital Accra, and produce regranulate in their own small “factories”. This is then sold to the local plastic recycler, who uses it to make paving stones or roof tiles.
The project also creates fair employment opportunities that enable women in the region to earn a secure and sustainable income for themselves and their families.
Buy Food with Plastic
The organisation Buy Food with Plastic organises events with locals in India, Nicaragua and Ghana, where the local population can buy a hot meal with plastic bottles. The collected bottles are then processed into useful products. Since 2018, these events have already seen over 42,000 PET bottles exchanged for 44,000 meals. In 2022, the organisation is planning a total of 26 more events in Nicaragua, India and Ghana to collect an additional 82,000 PET bottles and give around 1,750 people access to a recycling cycle.
Kiefel on board
Teamwork, social competences and peaceful conflict resolution are joined in a unique adventure on the sea.
Friedensflotte Salzburg is part of the Mirno More Friedensflotte, the greatest sailing project for socially disadvantaged young people.
By living, working and sharing experiences together on a ship, children who suffered particularly due to the Corona crisis, learn new ways of overcoming conflict, how to strengthen confidence as well as to find hope in the future.
Kiefel has supported this amazing initiative for several years already, which has allowed children to sail, learn and grow up emotionally.
SUSTAINABLE SUPPLIER RELATIONSHIPS
Kiefel Supplier Award
With our regular international "Kiefel Supplier Awards", we reward outstanding performance in services.
We look for consistant excellence in the areas of quality, service and technical support. Sustainability also plays a decisive role in the supplier evaluation.
A long-term and sustainable partnership with our suppliers is important to us, which is why we honor the best suppliers with the Kiefel Supplier Award every year.
Congratulations to this year's winner of the Kiefel Supplier Award!
Sustainability Certificates & Awards
NATUREFORMER KFT 90 Speed machine receives WorldStar 2023 Awards
The innovations and commitment of Kiefel for creating packaging solutions of the future and in responding to new challenges and global trends such as sustainability, hygiene and other trends, have been recognized by the WorldStar 2023 Awards.
WPO annually recognizes the best of the best in packaging innovations from all around the world, and in 2023 the NATUREFORMER KFT 90 Speed Machine has been one of them. This machine can process various kinds of natural fibers (renewable, CO2-binding, biodegradable, or disposable via the paper cycle) into high-quality sustainable packaging with the highest surface quality to achieve the hygienic standards of the foodstuffs, pharma and cosmetics industry. Additionally it has a low CO2 footprint.
EcoVadis places Kiefel among the top 25% of companies
We have reached another milestone on the way to more sustainable business processes: The world's largest provider of sustainability ratings, EcoVadis, has awarded the company, consisting of the Freilassing-based KIEFEL GmbH with subsidiaries in Micheldorf (Austria) and Sprang-Capelle (Netherlands), a silver medal in the overall ranking. This places the mechanical engineering company for thermoforming and joining technology among the most sustainable 25% of all companies audited by EcoVadis and even among the top 10% of the industry.
The EcoVadis certification is based on an extensive questionnaire on the four categories of "Environment", "Labor and human rights", "Ethics" and "Sustainable procurement". Only adequately documented responses and data are included in the assessment. The results are presented on a scorecard and can be shared with customers. According to the provider, they already certify more than 90,000 companies in over 175 countries in a wide variety of industries worldwide.
Among the finalists for German Sustainability Award 2021
With our NATUREFORMER series, machines for the production of packaging from natural fibers, we are among the 82 finalists for the German Sustainability Award in the "Design" category. Out of originally more than 1,000 applicants, we have been able to fight our way through.
The coveted national award recognizes excellence for a sustainable future. Now, our NATUREFORMER KFT one of them, impressing with thermoformed packaging made from renewable, biodegradable raw materials while making efficient use of energy and resources. The result: High quality product for the food sector, but also for cosmetics and electronical goods.
ABB Sustainability Award
Automation group ABB presented Kiefel with the international European Value Provider Award in the "Sustainability" category yesterday. This recognizes the development achievement of the NATUREFORMER KFT 90 machine, on which products made from natural fibers can be formed.
"We are very pleased to be the first company to win an award in the sustainability category," emphasizes Thomas Halletz, CEO of KIEFEL GmbH, at the award ceremony in the company's own technology center. "This underlines the great innovative strength that underlies our technologies." Andrea Cassoni, Managing Director of the General Industry division at ABB, adds: "As a mechanical engineering company, Kiefel is exemplary in terms of sustainability. The technology of the KFT 90 is an example of this, because the machines can be used to produce packaging from renewable and biodegradable raw materials or plant waste - combined with the highest possible energy and resource efficiency."
