Our profit is your profit

After three challenging years, gebana finally generated a profit again in 2025 – and we're sharing this profit in equal parts with our customers, employees and shareholders. It's the first distribution of profits for CEO Christophe Schmidt, who has been with gebana since 2022.

Why does gebana share the company's profits?

Christophe Schmidt: At gebana, we don't go it alone; we operate as part of a system that includes our employees, customers, producers and shareholders. As our motto says, "WE are changing the rules/YOU are changing the rules." Together, we're "working" to change global trade. And we expect a lot from our customers, too. For example, we ask them to pre-order fruit well in advance or share bulk packages. If things go well and we make a profit, everyone who is part of the system should benefit.

In practical terms, this means we're sharing CHF 500'000 of our profit with our customers this year by offering a 20% discount on our entire range until this amount has been used up.

This is your first time distributing profits as the CEO of gebana. Have you ever experienced anything like this at the companies you've worked for previously?

Other companies would consider the very idea of sharing profits with their customers crazy. By sharing our profit, gebana makes it much more tangible and meaningful. It's our profit and we're doing something with it. We use this money to bring about real change. To us, it's much more than just a metric for investors.

Why has gebana been unable to generate a profit over the past three years?

The start of the war in Ukraine, rising energy costs and inflation sent the organic market into a state of crisis. For many people, organic food became too expensive, and a lot of companies and brands have disappeared from the market. The situation also challenged gebana's impact and profit-driven model.

The fact that we managed to generate a profit again in 2025 shows that our model still works. Profit is an important metric here, but we have also continued to increase our impact throughout this period – and that’s just as important. What matters most to me is that we're still here and that our customers have stood by us.

Do you think it's fair that gebana's shareholders don't get a share of the profit?

This is a conscious decision by the shareholders themselves – they have chosen to reinvest their share of the profit in gebana. It's less about fairness and more about taking a long-term view. Our shareholders want the money to stay in the company so gebana can continue to grow. And they benefit when gebana does well and the company's value increases.

How will gebana be investing the shareholders' share of the profit this year?

Right now, we're investing heavily in the South and in customer acquisition. We want to push ahead in this area so we can achieve the objectives set out in our business plan.

We're in the process of setting up a chocolate factory in Togo, and in Burkina Faso we are making further investments in the completion of our cashew and mango factory.

What does profit distribution mean for employees?

We share our profit with all our employees – both in the North and the South. But the impact on income is particularly significant for those in the South.

The wages we pay our employees in the South are already above the local average, and the profit bonus is a meaningful source of additional income for many employees and their families.