PET bottled beer has been the growth engine of one of the top three brewers on the domestic market, Interbrew, producing Bergenbier, Stella Artois, Beck''s and Noroc brands, which has bolstered its sales by 7% this year, three times the average growth rate on the beer market as a whole.
"In the first nine months of this year, we logged 7% higher sales in comparison to the same period in 2004, in a context in which, according to MEMRB (a market research company) the beer market advanced by only 2.7% during the same period," says Mihai Albu, general manager of Interbrew Romania, a unit of InBev, global leader in he beer market.
Albu also specified that Interbrew''s figures were mainly due to the Bergenbier brand and to the evolution of the PET bottled beer market sector for both Bergenbier and Noroc. Beside these brands, the company is strengthening its position on the premium and super-premium segments with Stella Artois and Beck''s.
After the first half of this year, the company announced the best growth dynamics on the PET bottled beer segment, adding 7 percentage points to its market share, to 15.7%.
PET bottled beer started gaining ground against beer sold in regular bottles as early as last year, when, in line with MEMRB data, the PET bottled beer sector grew by 26% as compared with just 16% registered in 2003.
According to a survey performed by market research company AC Nielsen, the top 15 beer brands on the Romanian market include 10 brands that are also sold in PET bottles.
This year saw Romania continuing to act as one of the growth engines of InBev, together with Bulgaria, Russia and Ukraine. After the first nine months, InBev reported 6% organic growth from the previous year, with sales in Central and Eastern Europe surging by 12.3% from the corresponding period of 2004.
Last year, InBev''s Romanian unit reported turnover worth 103 million euros, with the sales volume exceeding two million hectolitres. Last year, too, the company''s operating income gained 30%.
During 11 years of presence on the Romanian market, Interbrew has made investments worth more than 145 million euros to consolidate the brands it produces domestically, namely Stella Artois, Beck''s, Bergenbier and Noroc. Beside these, Interbrew imports Leffe and Hoegaarden Belgian specialties.
The beer market last year reached 600 million euros (14 million hectolitres), slightly higher than the previous year, when it stopped at 550 million euros (12.8 million hectolitres). dana.ciriperu@zf.ro
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