Koska (Merter Helva)

Foundation Date: 1907

Founder: Halil İbrahim Adil Dindar 

History: The history of Koska reaches back to the early 1900s when Hacı Emin Bey ran a halva shop in the town of Denizli. Hacı Emin Bey’s son, Halil İbrahim Adil Dindar, moved to İstanbul with his sons in 1931 and opened a halva shop in the Koska district. In a short time, their delicious halva and desserts became quite popular. The shop was named after the neighborhood and it has stayed that way for the company’s history. Koska opened a factory in Topkapı in 1974 and started to produce Turkish delight, preserves and nougat as well as halva. In 1983, brothers Mümtaz and Nevzat Dindar decided locate their manufacturing to the newly built modern facilities in Merter and adopted the commercial title “Koska Helvacısı Merter”. The range and quality of the products rapidly increased in these new premises and the production of sesame oil was completely mechanized in 1990. This was an unprecedented practice in Turkey and it is still the only mechanism that allows sesame oil to be hygienically produced in its purest form. Koska is still being run by the third generation of the founding family and the production is undertaken at the new premises in Avcılar-Ambarlı junction with 17.000 m2 indoors space on 2.7 acres of land.

The replacement of all its production machinery with the latest technology enabled Koska to increase its production capacity without sacrificing quality, allowing the production of halva, sesame oil, molasses, preserves, honey, Turkish delight, wafers, croquant, pişmaniye, cacao-peanut paste and traditional Turkish desserts. In addition Koska has developed a line of  diabetic versions of halva, Turkish delight, almond paste and preserves using completely natural sweeteners thanks to the efforts of the food engineers in its modern laboratories. These Ministry of Health approved diabetic products were the first in the Turkish and global food industry. Koska acquired an ISO 9002 quality certificate in 2000, a HACCP hygiene certificate in 2002, an ISO 9001:2000 certificate in 2003, the latest quality certificate ISO 22.000 in 2009 and recently Kosher and Halal certificates and has never abandoned its commitment to quality. Koska, with its almost 700 hundred employees, believes that high quality production is only possible with high quality personnel and takes great care in the intensive training process of all its employees from the newly recruited production staff to the master chefs. As an outcome of this meticulous attitude, Koska was awarded with the “Customer Satisfaction Award” three years in a row and recently received the “Hygienic Production” award. Anyone who is interested is able to visit the factory and observe the production process and they are preparing a system that allows the customers to watch the production process live on the Internet.

In addition to its strong and efficient marketing network, Koska has built a widespread network of distributors covering the whole country with regional headquarters in Ankara, İzmir, Bursa, Antalya, Samsun, Erzurum and almost 150 retail stores in cities supported by a fleet of 700 distributor vehicles. Koska products are offered to the customers in a wide range of retailers in addition to the hypermarkets such as Migros, Gima, Real, Tansaş, Champion, Carrefour and etc as well as other local chainstores. As the largest producer of halva in Turkey, Koska also has a significant export volume with its exports to 60 countries in four continents. The busiest export destinations are mainly EU countries, USA, UK as well as Russia, Israel, Arab countries, Sweden and Denmark. Koska is not only marketed in the ethnic food stores but also in chain supermarkets in these countries. The objective of Koska is to become a global brand and thus, the marketing process involves various promotion activities as well as the tasting campaigns run by the distributors in different countries. 

Koska has one of the best brand recognition rates in Turkish food sector with a respected and trusted company image. The company as a whole is dedicated to preserving this position by remaining faithful to its current vision; and one of the most important future objectives of Koska is to become a brand sought after in the global market. 

Famous for: Halva varieties, sesame oil & molasses, preserves Turkish delights, organic products, diabetic series, wafers & croquants, summer series, tea varieties.

Promo Video: www.koska.com/kurumsal.aspx

 

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0800 219 01 65
www.koska.com