Cristian Burci, 44, a pioneer of advertising in Romania andfounder of Graffiti BBDO advertising group, who through hiscarriage operations has turned Romania into a European leader inthe field, says that in the current market context finding newmarkets is the only way to survive.
Burci started doing business in Romania right after therevolution on an advertising market that did not exist at thattime, and then got involved in carriage production and freighttransport, setting up International Railway Systems (IRS), aEuropean leader. The group he controls last year reached turnoverworth some 500m euros ad had around 7,000 employees.
His early strategy was very simple, as he says: filling the voidon the Romanian advertising market, a place with nocompetition.
Around 1992, he started the first advertising agency, Graffiti,which was the first full-service agency in Romania, in the wake ofinitial investments worth 60-70,000 dollars.
He then further expanded the group. He set up several agencies,split the media operations from Graffiti and took to the outdoorsegment. He subsequently linked up with BBDO US advertising giant,which took over 20% in the agency for 500,000 dollars, and he thusbecame a millionaire for the first time.
The group then moved to television and in 1997 bought a smalllicense in Bucharest, which it repackaged and rearranged and thenext year it launched it as Prima TV. In 2005, he sold it togetherwith the two radio stations he had bought for around 32-33m eurosin the meantime.
"By mistake, I got into the carriage business, but the mistaketurned out to be highly profitable. Being born in Turnu-Severin, hewas asked to get involved in rescuing the carriage plant in thecity, about to be closed down. In 2004, he managed to take controlover Severnav shipyard of the same city.
In 2004, he bought Romvag. The carriage businesses bought byBurci then boomed, turning Burci into a freight carriage leader inEurope.
Pentru alte știri, analize, articole și informații din business în timp real urmărește Ziarul Financiar pe WhatsApp Channels
