Founded in 1924, Mercur started its trajectory with products derived from rubber and is today one of the most  traditional Brazilian brands. Originated in Santa Cruz do Sul (RS), where it currently has two factories,Mercur is a reference in the segment of school and office supplies in which it consecrated the image of its eraser stamped with god Mercury in the subconscious of many generations of students.

Its history had a start thanks for the dirt roads, filled with bricks, which tore pieces of rubber off the solid tires of automobiles that circulated by the hillsides of Serra Geral, Rio Grande do Sul, in the 1920s of the past century.

In this setting, on 11 June 1924, the company Hoelzel Irmãos was born through the brothers Carlos Gustavo and Jorge Emílio Hoelzel.

With a start-up capital of ten contos de réis, the company that had three employees, besides repairing tires, also manufactured impermeable fabrics with rubber for many uses such as rain coats and hospital sheets.

In 1930, Jorge Emílio Hoelzel went to Europe to get acquainted with the innovations in rubber and bought a deactivated factory and brought it to Santa Cruz do Sul, where it had a line of production of more than two thousand products.

Two years later, the company had already employed 40 workers. It needed to substitute the simple workshop for its first industrial plant at Rua Cristóvão Colombo, where it still operates today, with more than 20 thousand m2.
During this time, Hoelzel manufactured heels for rubber shoes for a growing shoe industry and also started to produce erasers, which became one of the trademarks of the company. Hoses, oversleeves, rubber tubes, carpets and floor runners, rugs, syringes, showers, rings for compote glasses and cleaning products for typewriters were also part of the portfolio.

In 1950, the social reason becomes Hoezel S.A. Factory of Artifacts of Rubber Mercur. Seven years later the company accomplishes another milestone in its history entering in the era of plastic, however, not abandoning rubber. At the end of the 1950s, the quantity of products was so large that some started to become anti-economic,  which lead the company to review its production and to keep only 11 lines of production. In the beginning of the 1960s, Mercur diversified its activities. In 1963, Plásticos Mercur S/A was founded, set in the second industrial plant of the group: Distrito Industrial in Santa Cruz do Sul, an area which today occupies more than 120 thousand m2. In 1971, Metalplas Artefatos Esportivos Ltda was founded; an associated company specialized in manufacturing sports products such as tennis and ping-pong rackets.

In the end of 1980s, the company invested in farming, reforesting, raising cattle and making children and professional clothing. In 1991, a strategic decision merged all companies and Mercur S.A. appeared. In 1996, Mercur focused in some segments and was structured in three Business Units: School, Body Care and Coverings.

Currently, Mercur concentrates its business in four different units: Stationery (school, office and crafts), Body Care (products for sports, health and well-being), Coverings (flooring for civil constructions and customized solutions, providing rubber sheets, non-toxic straps and technical spare parts) and International (imports, exports and international management). The company directly employs about 550 collaborators and has a portfolio of more than 1,5 thousand items which vary from erasers, to glues and whiteouts, thermal bags, gymnastics balls, crutches, ink for crafts, paper for decoupage, tracks for industrial lines of production and tactile floorings.

 
Acting in the whole of Brazil through partners, Mercur commercializes its products in more than 30 countries in Asia, Europe and the Americas. In order to potentialize even more its exports, it has recently opened a subsidiary in the United States with the objective of expanding its businesses in the region and disseminating even more the brand throughout the world. Mercur is an example of innovation and tradition which goes hand in hand,because even consolidated, it presents consistent growth. In these more than 80 years in the market of rubber show that the formula to bet on innovation without giving up tradition has worked well. A proof of this is that Mercur has registered an average growth of 20% per year.