Our Story

Over the years, the business concept been the same – to offer long series of turned and milled wooden details. Our strength is that we have high quality products and that we can produce long series – at low costs.

The company’s history

1874-1916

The beginning of today’s Elfverson & Co was Kalmar Bobbin, a factory for thread spools. The business was started in 1874 by the German Wilhelm Heinrich Papenhagen, to meet the needs of the growing English textile industry. In 1894 the factory came into the Elfverson family’s possession and in 1912 a company in Påryd with closely related production was acquired. In 1916 Karl Elfverson died and his son Fritz took over.

1917-1940

In 1921 the factory burned down and the company went bankrupt. One year later, Elfverson & Co re-emerged thanks to Fritz and Ernst Gullbrandson.
In 1932, the production of yo-yo began, which still takes place today.

1941-1948

In the 40s, medicine jars and caps were the biggest products. Among the largest customers were Astra and Apoteksbolaget. The Ivarsson brothers (Brio) became customers of Elfverson.

1949-1960

In 1949, Elfverson & Co acquired a new customer, Armstrong Cork, that would buy woodtops for a variety of bottles. The tops went to everything from sherry, port, cognac, gin to whiskey.
In the 50’s, Elfverson made woodtops for Bacardi, Cointreau, Captain Morgan, Cinzano, Drambuie, Dry Sack, Cognac Bisquit, Harvey’s Bristol Cream, Hine, Johnnie Walker and Sandeman, among others.
In 1958, Elfverson acquired its first yo-yo customer in Canada, Cheerio Co. The yo-yos that were made for them are among the most desirable among collectors today.

1960-1975

In the 1960s, Brio was the largest customer. The clown, Dachsie and Sampo are some names of products that were manufactured for the company in Osby.
The Elfverson family also engaged in the sale of, among other things, glass, and had an office in New Jersey, Elverson Trading, Inc.
In January 1973, the Elfverson family sold the factory to the Hexagon Group.

1975-1990

In 1975, the yo-yo boom began, ending in 1978. The largest customer, Parker Bros. in Canada bought 1.099.000 yo-yos, which is the company’s record for one year.
By the end of the 70’s, almost no woodtops were made anymore.
In 1983, Elfverson & Co received its first order of woodtops for Glenmorangie Single Malt. These were to be manufactured until 2007. A total of 44 million Glenmorangie woodtops were manufactured.
In 1990, Hexagon sold the company to Vätterledens Invest.

1990-2000

In 1996, Elfverson & Co became ISO certified.
In 1997, Elfverson & Co bought a company that manufactured dowels, Flerotappen, and moved operations to Påryd. In this way, Elfverson gained many new customers in the furniture and kitchen industry, such as IKEA, Marbodal, EFG and Ballingslöv. At most, 200 million dowels were sold in one year.

2000-2010

In 2000, dowel production was moved to Latvia.
2006 was the last year that Elfverson manufactured toy parts for Brio, when the company moved its production to China.
2009 was a gloomy year for the company, with an unusually low revenue due to the financial crisis.

2010-Framåt

In 2018, Corticeira Amorim bought 70% of the shares from Vätterledens Invest.
In 2020, Amorim bought the remaining 30%.
In 2022, a new company was formed in Portugal under the name Elfverson Investimentos & Participaçoes S.A.
The company was founded by Amorim Bartop S.A. and J.C. Ribeiro S.A., Elfverson’s two largest customers. All shares in Elfverson & Co AB were transferred to the new company in Portugal. In this way Elfverson and Co AB is owned by both Portuguese companies with 50% each.
If you want to read the press release, click here.