The traditional line of Photo has been at the founding roots of Attard organisation ever since 1924. For decades, photography remained a linchpin until the dawn of digital that changed the world of imaging forever, and with it, consumer behaviour.
Whilst many big names in the industry perished with the demise of silver halide film, Attard's Photo Division anticipated the worst well in time and went about adapting its infrastructure to conform with the digital age. Shored up by the key name in cameras - Olympus – and with the right investments at our sister plant Agfa Photo Labs (see also www.agfalabmalta.com), the fundamentals were in place for Attard to take the next grand leap ahead in a changed world.
If luck played a hand in Attard's fortunes - indeed, not by any fluke chance - than that was certainly on 1st. March 2009 when Spectrum Brands Int'l appointed us as the exclusive distributors for Varta Batteries. Almost overnight, this event changed the face of business from being one of "just photo" into a supplier of general consumer products. This prompted us into taking a more holistic approach to the once-Photo line that would as of now not only deal in solely photo, but it would also incorporate 3 other areas related to consumer batteries, artists' materials (Talens, Daler-Rowney) and leisure commodities like swim gear (Salvas).
Not content to stop there, we felt the time was ripe to give a modernistic look and new direction through creating a subsidiary firm by the name of Oval Brands Limited. The name has its significance in more ways than one : a 4 letter word to denote 4 areas of interest, hence the 4 boxes relating to each field that appear in our logo and the choice of letters "OV", a fitting tribute to the company that had the merit to build up Varta's reputation in Malta since 1961, namely O & V. Photographic Ltd. and which today has its interests fused with Attard. The "VA" is taken out of Varta and "AL" is representative of Attard Ltd. Enough said, though. It's not what the name inspires that gets the job done, but rather the people who make up our new enterprise and that are its soul. Same as the calibre of brands we represent which are amongst the elite in each sphere of operation. Of all these, we can truly be proud.