Several Ukrainian cities have introduced another strict lockdown, but the Danish companies Danfoss and Guldmann, say that they are ready.
Ukrainian cities such as Kyiv, Lviv, and Odesa have introduced a new harsh quarantine to stop the spread of Covid-19. Most shops have to stay closed, and public buses only operate with a limited number of passengers. The quarantine will naturally affect businesses, but Danish Danfoss and Guldmann say that they are ready to cope with the quarantine, using previous experiences from last year.
“Since Guldmann-Ukraine is a production company, we remained operational during lock-downs in back in March-May, 2020 and now. We achieve this by implementing safety measures, such as masks, disinfectants, and temperature control, provision of transportation for company employees to/from work, vitamins provision, and offering free flu vaccination. However, the most important in my view – constant encouragement of employees to remain home with the slightest COVID symptoms,” says Taras Yurynts, Managing Director for Guldmann, which is a company working with development, manufacture, and sales of welfare technology in Ukraine.
It is a similar situation in Danfoss, says Andriy Berestyan, Managing Director for Danfoss in Ukraine. Danfoss will also rely on safety measures.
“We are already adopted to lockdowns. Definitely, it affects some businesses, especially wholesalers, which are selling vis outlet shops. It is closed in lockdown, and of course, it affects the business. As Danfoss, we, of course, follow legal UA regulations, at the same time, use corporate regulations. It is mainly related to the number of people present in the office, distance, customer visits, etc.,” he says, “If customers accept visits, we are visiting customers, as most of them are tired from online communication. At the same time, we have a recommendation to avoid F2F visits in red zones if there is no critical need.”
Covid might affect work in the future
Yurynts says that he expects business to return to normal after the corona-crisis, while Berestyan says that he thinks that the experience with Covid-19 will have a lasting impact. For example, when it comes to how we communicate.
“Here it already affects the way of doing business, pushing us more use of online communication tools for internal and external, communication. Our advanced IT infrastructure allows us to work as “flex office” – basically no difference, if the person present in office or work from home. I believe such flex-setup will continue regardless pandemic situation. We manage to serve our customers with the same level of service, in some cases even better, as before pandemia,” says Berestyan.
“Also, we use more digital tools in PR/Promo marketing activities. But all this will not replace F2F communication. I believe F2F will continue to be on a high level after pandemia,” he adds.
Guldmann dream about higher sales
Berestyan says that Danfoss Ukraine has experienced an increase in online sales and that this is the same trend that the company saw even before the pandemic. Today, they are doing more meetings in person, but that does not mean that it will continue to be this way post-corona. It depends on the customer, he says.
“My forecast is that the best customer experience is a right combination of online and F2F instruments to the business. A different approach, online/offline, has different effectiveness to cover particular customer need,” Berestyan says.
Yurynts at Guldmann hope that there might be a more significant demand for healthcare products after the pandemic, which will benefit Guldmann.
“Hopefully, funding of healthcare sector will increase, and there will be more demand for equipment to handle people in nursing centers and hospitals,” Yurynts says.
