Our history
While URGO Group has grown since then, it has kept its entrepreneurial spirit, its boldness and agility, that make him innovate in all areas to design tomorrow's health solutions.
Birth of the Fournier Laboratories
Eugène Fournier et Pierre Bon found a small pharmacy. With the years, it grows with the opening of offices, stores, production workshops, a laboratory and a factory.
Jean Le Lous takes overFournier Laboratories
Jean Le Lous, a 29-year old pharmacist takes over the company.
The URGO brand is born
Jean Le Lous creates the brand URGO with the objective of making dressings avaiblable to individuals and pharmacies. The ready-to-use bandage is invented and speeds up the success and fame of the brand!
Juvamine is born
Hervé Le Lous, Jean Le Lous' son, founds the Juva Santé Laboratories and the Juvamine brand, which is well-known in France thanks to the first advertising and pioneering TV campaign of 3 successive spots.
Juvamine is one of the first brands to market food supplements and vitamins into super- and hypermarkets.
Purchasing of the Mercurochrome brand
Purchasing of Mercurochrome, the first aid brand in super and hypermarkets.
Emblematic brand well-known in France for its small red bottle, Mercurochrome has become a reference in health and well-being since its creation in 1917.
Since then, Mercurochrome has developed its portfolio with plasters, bandages, compresses, tapes, accessories ; but its expertise also covers the health and beauty sector: podiatry, childcare, muscles and join pain, oral and dental hygiene, winter ailments and essential oils.
Purchasing of the SUPER DIET brand
URGO Group acquires the French brand SUPER DIET, a pioneer brand committed to develop organic and natural food supplements.
Purchasing of the anti-parasite solutions Marie-Rose
Marie Rose is the anti-parasite expert in hypermarkets and supermarkets.
Since 1934, Marie Rose ensures the well-being of the whole family with its range of anti-mosquito and anti-lice products.
Creation of the Intimy brand
The sexual well-being brand of Juva Santé Laboratories joins the healthcare shelves in hypermarkets and supermarkets with a large scope of products: classic, technical and playful condoms, lubricants and massage gels
Birth of Urgo Medical
The first medical dressing of the Group is launched and gives birth to a new division, Urgo Medical, specialized in the treatment of severe chronic and acute wounds.
Startup when it launched, URGO Group's medical care division is now the 2nd largest player on the wound-healing European market and has developed customised treatment & care protocols adapted to each wound.
URGO Group starts URGO Consulting !
URGO Consulting is our own internal consulting firm and enables talented young graduates to start rapidly their career and develop their skills through a large scope of internal missions.
The Vivasanté Group is born
Gathering medical and consumer healthcare activities, Vivasanté Group is created
Herbesan, OM3 and Alvityl join URGO Group's portfolio !
URGO Group purchases three brands:
Herbesan, a leading brand in the Natural Health and Wellness industry, with products available from pharmacies and health and beauty retailers
OM3, emblematic actor specialized in omega-3s,
Alvityl, a brand on the dietary supplements market with complete formulas and adapted formats to fulfill the health needs of young and old
A freshness wind blows on URGO Group !
The Ricqlès brand, the peppermint essential oil expert, joins URGO Group's portfolio
Purchasing of the Belloc brand
URGO Group purchases BELLOC, one of the French leading pharmaceutical brands on the digestion segment.
Creation of the URGO University
URGO Group is launching its own corporate academy. Its particularity? The Group's top managers are the lecturers, allowing them to pass on their experience and methods to the group’s executives. They can share their good practices and working methods while fostering exchange between companies.
Since 2009, more than 600 employees have been trained to one or more existing courses: Finance, Decision Analysis, Management & Leadership, Negotiation, Project Management...
Heading for Brazil
URGO Group purchases the company LM Farma, one of the leaders on the Brazilian wound healing market, starting the Group's development in Latin America.
Since then, URGO Group has considerably reinforced its presence in the region, in particular in Colombia, in Chile and in Mexico.
Creation of the SUPER DIET Laboratories
A new entity is founded to gather 6 brands, offering natural solutions: Super Diet, Ricqlès, Oligocéan, Herbesan, Belloc and OM3
URGO Group develops its presence in Poland
The purchasing of the polish company Bioprofil, specialized in the distribution of dermo-cosmectics products, starts the beginning of a great adventure in Central and Eastern Europe, where URGO Group will establish a regional direction a few years leater.
In 2013, URGO Group purchases a portfolio of well-known polish brands: Polfa Lodz (vitamins, minerals and food supplements), Alsacin and Alugastrin
Purchasing of the Italian company Agave
Recognized expert on the Italian food supplement market and based in Bologna, Agave has developed a wide and innovative range of products
Birth of URGO Group !
Vivasanté changes its name and becomes URGO Group !
Birth of UrgoTech, our internal startup
Founded to imagine and develop breakthrough innovations in healthcare, UrgoTech, URGO Group's startup, begins our digital chapter
Purchasing of SONALTO
URGO Group enters the hearing aids market with the acquisition of SONALTO, a French startup specialized in listening devices available in pharmacies.
First steps in aesthetic surgery
UrgoTouch, a portable laser designed for post-operative scars is launched by URGO Group's medical division
URGO Group reaches the 3 000 employees !
First steps in India and Colombia
URGO Group establishes a strategic partnership with the family-owned Indian company Eucare, one of the most recognized local players in wound healing.
The same year, the Group purchases GERCO, a company founded in 1950, based in Cartagena in Colombia, with a staff of 90 people.
GERCO offers consumer healthcare solutions that are well known by local consumers. The company has a production and distribution centre in Cartagena.
The four flagship ranges and products leaders on their market developed by GERCO are:
- Anti-rash and anti-irritation creams
- Pain-killing creams for athletes
- Anti-lice treatments
- Physiological serums
URGO Group launches a startup mentorship program
The "URGO Mentorship Program" is a tailor-made support program for startups in medical technology
URGO sets foot in the USA !
URGO and US Texas-based company SteadMed merge their North American medical activities, with Urgo Medical taking a majority stake in this strategic partnership, whose activities focus on acute and chronic wounds.
Urgo Medical North America will operate in the USA and Canada to become a global leading player in the world’s largest advanced wound care market of North America. The perfect fit between the range of products of both companies enable the new entity to offer best in class treatments to treat acute and chronic wounds.
A new generation at the head of URGO Group !
Hervé Le Lous, the company’s founder, has built URGO Group around strong family values. He has worked with his three sons for more than 10 years to build a pioneering company at the cutting-edge of medical technologies. In June, a new organization of URGO Group's Executive Direction was announced: an alternating family chairmanship. Hervé Le Lous’ sons, Briac, Tristan and Guirec Le Lous will in turn chair URGO Group.
In September, Briac Le Lous succeeds his father and become the new Chairman of URGO Group, for three years.