Alexandra Lewis lives in South London and works in marketing and communications at professional services firm Aon. A recent road trip across Portugal with her husband Dave led to Portuguese paper consumption goods producer Renova’s store in Torres Novas.
Recently we went on an epic road trip across Portugal, driving from Lisbon up to Porto and eating our way through many of the country’s wonderful pastel de nata! I have a love of collecting anything that is wonderful and quirky, and a particular fondness for bags and napkins with unique designs – I have been collecting intriguingly designed ones from bars, restaurants, and shops for many years!
So my husband Dave suggested we stop off in Torres Novas, Zibreira, to visit a place he knew would fit the bill – “the most colourful shop in the world”, also known as Renova’s gift shop.
We had so much fun. The branding across the whole range is amazing! The store is packed full of all Renova’s products and special limited-edition items, and so of course we had to fill up a Renova-branded bag. It contained a large pack of purple tissues, my favourite colour.
And, of course, I also had to pick up the limited-edition pocket tissues with the iconic Mary images.
History
The origins of the Renova brand date back to 1818, where the first use of the Renova watermark on paper manufactured in the location where the company still maintains its headquarters today was identified
A milestone: the launch of Renova Black, the first black toilet paper in the world, reaching the status of an iconographic product
Company motto: “Colourful designs and new functional solutions through stylish and environmentally-happy products”
Millennium: Renova launched the first range of paper products certified with the European Union Ecolabel, Renovagreen, which are products manufactured with 100% recycled paper and packaged in recyclable paper
Investment: in 2015, Renova became the first European tissue producer to invest in Valmet’s Advantage NTT tissue technology. PM7 started-up the line at its Torres Novas site in 2016.