Company History
It all began in 2006
HybridSupply Ltd. was established in October 2006 by three partners in Beckum (Westphalia). The managing director Oskar Kowalski was only 21 years old and in the first year of his apprenticeship as a wholesale and export merchant.
HybridSupply Ltd. was established in October 2006 by three partners in Beckum (Westphalia). The managing director Oskar Kowalski was only 21 years old and in the first year of his apprenticeship as a wholesale and export merchant.
The first warehouse of 35 m² storage area was located in the basement of his family home and in the adjoining garage.
At the end of 2006, the product range already comprised 339 products, of which about half were in stock.
Loading and unloading of shipments was carried out entirely by hand. Particularly curious was the unloading of 40-ton trucks in a housing area. The goods were commissioned daily into the night and prepared for pickup in the garage. GLS had its own garage key and could pick up the goods the following day while the founders were doing their “actual” work.
Telephone customer queries were forwarded to an office telephone service (eOffice) and answered during the lunch break. All the later incoming calls were directly answered after the “actual” work.
The manageable storage system consisted mainly of large cartons and borrowed yellow post boxes from Deutsche Post. At this point, we would like to give our sincere thanks to Deutsche Post AG for their support, which contributed to the positive development of the HybridSupply.
2007
In the middle of 2007, the first earnings were invested in a small storage system with semi-open front storage containers, so that the post boxes could be returned to the Post undamaged. The product range was extended to 383 products until the end of the year.
2008
In April, HybridSupply moved into its first own business premises in Hamm (Westphalia) with a total area of 300 m²: 150 m² offices and 150 m² storage area.
Thursday, July 9, 2015 The new ERP system ensured fully automatic order fulfillment with an interface to the online store to the largest extent. Due to this progress, a great many orders were handled by a small team, without excessively increasing the costs.
The new storage area of 150 m² was optimally extended in mid-2008 by a small high-bay warehouse system. This enabled the product range to be expanded to 566 articles by the end of the year. It thus comprised almost 48% more products than at the end of 2007.
Six employees were recruited by the end of 2008 in HybridSupply.
2009
The product range was expanded further to 909 products in this year, despite the severe market downturn due to the global financial crisis. Thereby, the adverse conditions were defied by the German “scrappage premium”: Through it, vehicles that are old and potentially interested in LPG conversion were withdrawn from sale.
In June 2009, HybridSupply introduced the first premium valve protection additive with TÜV-certified quality control under the product name of V-LUBE Valve Saver after more than a year’s development work. Already at the commercial launch, V-LUBE aroused keen interest in the existing customers.
The huge demand made it possible: HybridSupply already employed ten employees at the end of the year.
2010
In July, the project V-LUBE was spun into V-LUBE GmbH to continuously accelerate the international development and to meet high demand.
The rapidly advancing growth in sales and products required a further expansion of storage capacities. Relocation and renovations related to it (December 2010 to March 2011) increased the overall capacity to approx. 570 m²; of which approx. 200 m² was office space and 370 m² storage.
The extent of the product range considerably increased once again at the end of 2010 – by around 43% to 1,303 items.
2011
In this year, HybridSupply particularly accelerated the expansion of international distribution structures. Besides other EU countries, China and Thailand were particularly a factor for the significant growth.
In March, HybridSupply in association with V-LUBE GmbH exhibited at GasShow, Europe’s largest Trade Fair for LPG and natural gas in Warsaw.
The product range grew in 2011 to 1928 products – a further increase over the previous year by, believe it or not, almost 48%.
2012
Even in 2012, HybridSupply successfully continued their astonishing growth both nationally and internationally. More than 30% of total sales was already accounted for through exports.
In 2012, HybridSupply maintained business relations worldwide in 49 countries.
In March, HybridSupply in association with V-LUBE GmbH exhibited at GasShow in Warsaw once again, in order to strengthen its international presence further.
The product range comprising of by now 2,937 items and the increasing export area caused current storage capacities to reach their limits. Even so, the product range was increased by more than 52% within one year.
In October, the Executive Board therefore decided to relinquish the location in Hamm and relocate to the vicinity of a deep-water port, in order to further meet the steadily increasing demand.
In December 2012, the HybridSupply online shop was relaunched as a multilingual version featuring an improved user interface.
The number of employees rose to twelve.
2013
The relocation from Hamm to Lübeck took place in March at the same time as the fair-trade appearance at GasShow in Warsaw. HybridSupply Ltd. expanded its business premises to about 1,000 m² and included a modern high-bay storage system.
The product range was further extended according to the requirements of national and international customers – now already to more than 3,400 products.
2014
With the establishment of the subsidiary HybridSupply Bulgaria EOOD in Bulgaria in December 2014, HybridSupply expanded its business operations to Eastern Europe, the Balkans and Latin America.
In order to meet the continuously increasing customer demands, HybridSupply extended its service and product range consistently in this year. The product range now contains around 4,300 items.
2015
HybridSupply and HybridSupply Bulgaria EOOD exhibited at Gasshow in association with the Argentinean producer TA Gas Technology (Fuel System Solution) and presented the TA SIGAS-LPG- and natural gas conversion system as an exclusive distributor for the European market.
2016
The legal form of HybridSupply Limited was converted to HybridSupply GmbH. HybridSupply GmbH is the parent company of the independent subsidiaries HybridSupply Bulgaria EOOD and V-LUBE GmbH.
The current product range includes around 7,000 products. HybridSupply employs 17 employees in Germany and abroad.
Meanwhile, HybridSupply serves its customers through native speakers among others in German, English, Spanish, Italian, Chinese, French, Bulgarian, Polish, Russian, Romanian, Ukrainian and Dutch.