Did hubris and money bring down the protagonist of this story, or was it the wild capitalism that swept through Poland after 1989? Did he miscalculate his capabilities, or was he betrayed by his German partner? The story of the Bolesławiec founder of a pretzel-stick factory ends in failure, but before that happens, it is like the American dream.
Ryszard Ruliński is a Bolesławiec native. He finished primary school here, founded and ran a major company here, set out from here to do even bigger business around the world, and still lives here today.
Top scorer
As Ruliński himself said, he came from a poor family. His father left Radomsko for France in 1937 to look for work, and after the war returned to the then “Recovered Territories” and chose Bolesławiec as his place of residence. The Ruliński family had three sons. After primary school, Ryszard went to the Food Technology Technical School in Legnica. There he studied and played basketball passionately—and successfully. He was the top scorer among secondary schools; his record was 89 points in a league game. Metal Kluczbork bought him, but despite his successes, he did not become a professional player. He returned to Bolesławiec.
During his military service, he was sent to a cook-and-waiter training course. He was so ashamed of this service job that he tore up the diploma. In the army, he learned how to prepare menus and provide food supplies for soldiers. With a master baker’s diploma and a duplicate of the torn diploma for completing the cook-and-waiter course, he was able to start his own business in 1983: a pretzel-stick factory.
His first million earned under a beer stand
It was the middle of martial law. Having his own company was a challenge. Ruliński borrowed money for the business from acquaintances and took out a bank loan. He lacked specialists to start up the machines. A baker from Lubin, Andrzej Górzyński, helped by sending two experienced employees to Ruliński’s plant. To buy raw materials and pay the employees’ first wages, the entrepreneur had to sell his own car.
Ruliński earned his first million selling pretzel sticks outside beer stands throughout Lower Silesia. This is how he obtained money for raw materials, packaging and employee wages. He secured his first business contacts and clients only later, at the Poznań food trade fairs. He was keen to launch wholesale sales.
Croissants, French pastries from Bolesławiec
The production of French croissants was a major success. Ruliński read about Poland’s first French-bread bakery in Kurier Polski. The bakery had been founded in Warsaw by a Swiss citizen. The very day the Bolesławiec entrepreneur read the article, he boarded a train to Warsaw armed with cognac and Polish vodka.
He questioned the staff, while the cognac and vodka loosened tongues. He obtained a contact and wrote to the Swiss man, proposing that he establish a company with him. The Swiss replied, but Ruliński did not accept any of his three offers. He learned that Bank Handlowy in Warsaw was granting loans to purchase French machinery.
Obtaining such a loan bordered on a miracle. Yet the Bolesławiec native became the first Pole to receive money from the bank. Apparently, the bank clerk handling his case burst into tears of joy.
After a visit to Paris, Ruliński bought the machines and began production. The Bolesławiec croissants sold better than hot cakes. Poles bought them wholesale and sold them even in… Berlin. Customers from all over Lower Silesia came for the baguettes and croissants.
Oh! Water from 200 million years ago in a plastic bottle
“We can sleep peacefully and not worry about good water for ourselves and future generations,” said the city president Józef Król at a meeting at Rulimpex on June 14, 1995. “Today, this is a true treasure worth its weight in gold!”
For the new production, Ryszard Ruliński had his own mineral-water intake from Triassic formations (200–220 million years old!) with excellent parameters and exceptional health value. The water source, located at a depth of 82 metres, received certification from the National Institute of Hygiene of the Research Institute in Poznań. City officials, including then-city president Józef Król, attended the ceremonial launch of mineral-water production.
Ruliński initially imported the water bottles, but later began producing them on machines imported from Geneva. Then production began of juices containing fruit particles. The orange and grapefruit juices won many awards, including Polagra gold medals in 1996 and 1999 and the European Medal awarded by the Office of the Committee for European Integration in 2000.
The “Och!” brand owned by Ruliński’s products entered the European and American markets, where it won awards for the quality of its juices and beverages.
Ryszard Ruliński attended a business conference at Yale in the United States, met Zbigniew Brzeziński, national security adviser to President Jimmy Carter, and went on trade missions with many ministers, President Aleksander Kwaśniewski, and Prime Ministers Jerzy Buzek and Józef Oleksy, as well as Włodzimierz Czarzasty. From 1996 to 1999, he appeared on Wprost weekly’s list of the 100 richest Poles.
Włodzimierz Lubański promotes Rulimpex; BKS goalkeeper wins a truckload of juice
Taking advantage of Ryszard Ruliński’s success, he invited a football star to Bolesławiec to promote his products. The Bolesławiec stadium was packed, and national television stations and sports journalists came to the city.
Lubański took a penalty against BKS goalkeeper Władysław Wężyk. The winner of the duel was to receive a truckload of juice. Wężyk saved the penalty, and Ruliński gave away two truckloads of beverages. The goalkeeper and Ruliński decided to distribute the juices to the spectators.
“I haven’t seen queues like that for my cartons in a long time,” said Ryszard Ruliński in an interview with Rocznik Bolesławiecki.
Over the years, Ryszard Ruliński employed two thousand people. His plant was a sheltered workshop, and he organized a non-public hospital on its premises. It seemed that his good fortune would never end, but then came 2003…
In 2003, the major German company Richa-Fruchta approached Ruliński with an offer to purchase 76% of the shares in the Och! juice and beverage factory. The merger was negotiated for three months. The company offered 25 million dollars and a five-year term as Ruliński’s president. Ruliński planned to build a ceramic-tile factory in the zone in Wykroty. However, in December 2003, a telegram arrived from the prospective German partner: the Germans had suspended the investment because of the difficult economic situation.
The bigger you are, the more you can lose…
“I suffered enormous losses by trusting this company,” Ryszard Ruliński says in an interview with Rocznik Bolesławiecki 2020. “The juice factory lost its sheltered-workshop status. To save the company, I had to close the non-public healthcare facility and lay off many employees—and we should remember that collective redundancies are very expensive. I also had to take out mortgages against the French bakery and the house. This went on for five difficult years. The bakery’s income was used to repay the loans, but it was not enough; the liabilities were too high. The company went bankrupt in 2007. In 2010, I closed the bakery and laid off 50 employees. A court-appointed administrator took over. He valued the factory at 28 million. Just look at the difference between that valuation and the one made by the Germans. I remind you, it was 25 million dollars. The factory was sold for 2 million, which meant bankruptcy for me,” Ruliński says in the interview.
“You know, he respected us…”
An interview with a former company accountant about Ryszard Ruliński was quoted in Rocznik Bolesławiecki 2020.
“He had a humanistic approach to people,” Leokadia Laudańska says of Ruliński. “He noticed employees’ personal problems, appreciated our work and paid us well. You know, he respected us. He looked after his employees like few others did, and I know what I’m saying because I had several bosses. Sadly, I must mention two matters that were the main causes of the company’s collapse. First, his boundless faith in people’s honesty and goodwill. Many took advantage of it. They were happy to take loans without repaying them. The second thing was his weakness for the bottle. Eventually he became lost, lost control; he was losing money while others enriched themselves at his expense,” the accountant says.
In the interview, Ryszard Ruliński also admits that if many people had repaid their loans, he would be living much better, and that he encountered kindness more often from people who owed him nothing than from those who owed him a great deal.
Rocznik Bolesławiecki 2020, which contains the full interview with Ryszard Ruliński, can be purchased from the City History Department at 14 Kutuzowa Street for PLN 30.