Baltika continues market expansion
have improved by a healthy 61 per cent, to 5.5 million hecolitres.
This led to a jump in revenue to RUR 7.5 billion (€210m) for the
same period, although the company did not provide any comparative
figure for the previous quarter.
The company also reported that on a year-on-year basis its sales had increased 14 per cent and that June sales alone had jumped to 2 million hectolitres.
The results will be a major boost for Baltika's aim to increase its foothold on the still growing Russian beer market. Indeed, at the start of the year the company had a 20 per cent market share in Russia, but the latest quarter's results push that share up to 22 per cent. During 2003 Russians consumed some 7.7 billion litres of beer.
A recent report from Euromonitor highlighted the fact that right now in Russia it is the premium beer that is now driving increase in the Russian beer market and that it is Baltika that is leading the way in this segment of the market.
Euromonitor says that despite the fact that large numbers of Russian living in more remote and rural regions prefer to buy cheaper local beers, the marketing efforts of companies such as Baltika are still having a major impact on the market.
Owned jointly by Carlsberg and Scottish & Newcastle, Baltika still remains quintessentially Russian, and has been a major driving force behind the rapid development of the beer market there, despite the arrival of high-profile foreign brewers such as Interbrew.
Dominated by the Baltika 7 brand, domestic premium lager is the fastest growing area in the Russian beer sector, according to Euromonitor, accounting for more than 70 per cent of total premium beer sales. Indeed, Baltika 7 holds a whopping 51.8 per cent of the market, while Baltika Zolotoe is the second-largest premium lager brand with 6.7 per cent and Sibirskaya Korona (from Sun Interbrew) is in third place with 4 per cent.
