Juha Ihalainen
By : Greg Goodale
When Juha Ihalainen began his career, there were few Finnish companies giving their employees opportunities to work abroad, and the level of globalization was limited in most commercial markets.
He had his first taste of life outside Finland during a summer job in Germany with household furniture manufacturer Asko, an experience that led him to apply to the Turku School of Economics and Business Administration. After the course, he was headhunted for a job at Finpap, at the time the worlds largest paper exporter.
Determined to find a job abroad, he took a course at the Export Training Institute in Helsinki that included a years work placement. With that he was able to return to Germany and work for Asko at its Cologne headquarters. The company put to use his local knowledge as a managing director of Scan Life, a subsidiary that dealt in Scandinavian furniture, which enjoyed great popularity at the time.
In 1981, Ihalainen and his wife decided their children should get a Finnish education and he accepted the post of export director at Martela. His 10 years with the company saw his children grow up and leave home, while he took charge of some 60% of Martelas turnover, helping the company to achieve 50% market share in Finland. He then decided it was time to tackle Europes largest emerging market Poland. In 2001, he was appointed director of Martelas European division as marketing director for the entire group and chairman of Martela Design Center in Poland.
Past Notes
1971 Graduated from Finlands Turku School of Economics and Business Administration
1971 Export manager for Finnpap
1974 Product manager at Asko, Cologne
1975 Graduated from the Helsinki Export Training Institute
1981 Joined Martela as export director
2001 Appointed chairman of the board of Martela design center
Word of advice
Poland is not yet a big market for its population. It has the same value as the Finnish market, and we have only 5 million people.
