Lankro Chemicals
of Bentcliffe Works, Salters Lane, Eccles, Manchester. Telephone: Eccles 1686-7. Cables: "Lancro, Eccles, Manchester"
1936 'Golden jubilee for Lankro.
It was a wet Sunday in October 1936 when a Jewish businessman, his wife and father-in-law arrived in Manchester to seek a new life after fleeing from Nazi Germany. On the following day they visited Eccles to see a disused factory suggested to them by the Board of Trade as being suitable for a chemical plant. In the following year Lankro Chemicals began in business there taking its name from LANcashire and KROch, Dr Heinz Kroch, the founder. Lankro went public in 1959 and was bought by Diamond Shamrock of America in 1978. The British management bought it back last year and it continues to thrive as a speciality manufacturer with world-wide markets. To celebrate its golden jubilee Lankro will hold a dinner at the Portland Hotel Manchester on Friday March 20.[1]
1937 Company established. [2]
1947 British Industries Fair Advert as Manufacturers of: Pigment Colour, Bates, Chemicals and Oils for Leather; Plasticisers for Plastics and Lacquers; Wetting, Washing and Scouring Agents for Textiles; Fur Dressing Oils; Anti-Froth Compounds for Yeast. (Chemicals etc. Section - Olympia, Ground Floor, Stand No. A.1167) [3]
In the 1950s and 60s the range of chemicals manufactured expanded to include sulphonated plasticisers, chlorinated herbicides, polymerised polyols based on ethylene and propylene oxides, and various miscellaneous esters.
In the 1970s Lankro merged with Diamond Shamrock.
1988 Acquired by Harrisons and Crosfield[4]
Became Akcros Chemicals.
2016 Acquired by Valtris Specialty Chemicals.