Romanian poultry meat producer to invest in expansion

29-Jan-2018 - Last updated on 29-Jan-2018 at 12:12 GMT

Avi-Top supplies major Romanian retailers and said its expansion would pave the way for more products to hit shelves

Avi-Top plans to invest €6 million to modernise its production capacity, allowing the Romanian poultry producer to significantly grow its revenue, according to senior company representatives.

“Our good financial results are a result of the investments we have made in the past,” Ciprian Postolache, sales director of Avi-Top, told local business daily Ziarul Financiar.

Sales to rise

Under the plan, the investments are to enable Avi-Top to boost its sales by as much as 65% within the next two years, according to Postolache.

In 2017, the Romanian company generated revenues of about €15m. Should the expansion project bring the expected results, Avi-Top could increase this to about €24.75m in two years.

Located in the country’s Iași province, in north-eastern Romania, Avi-Top said its portfolio comprises a wide range of poultry products. These include fillets, breasts, wings and other products marketed under the Avi-Top, Cinci Stele (Five Stars) and 1001 Specialitati (1001 Specialities) brands. Avi-Top’s facilities are ISO 9001-, 14001- and 22000-certified, according to data from the Romanian firm.

In addition to its main distribution channels, which include major retailers and the hotel, restaurant and café (HoReCa) segment, Avi-Top operates its own retail network, which comprises about 30 stores in Romania and Moldova. The majority of the retail outlets that sell Avi-Top’s products are located in north-eastern Romania.

Avi-Top is part of Romania’s S C Kosarom group, which comprises three companies from the country’s meat industry. Aside from Avi-Top, these include meat processing subsidiary Kosarom, which offers poultry and pork meat products, and pig breeding offshoot Suinprod. The group is controlled by the Apostol family.

Foreign expansion plans

Neculai Apostol, the holding’s founder, recently said that Kosarom exports between 17% and 20% of its annual production to various foreign markets, mainly other member states of the European Union. Some of the group’s key export destinations include the UK, Germany and Spain. Kosarom also sells smaller amounts of its products to Italy and the Netherlands, according to Apostol.

In the German market, the Romanian holding has high hopes for its ongoing expansion in sales to Germany’s retailer Rewe, which operates more than 3,000 supermarkets in its domestic market.

“The German market is not easy to enter, because they know how to protect their own production. But if you manage to meet all the required standards, it is possible to enter this market,” said Apostol.

Kosarom’s increased exports have contributed to the group’s growth over recent years. In 2016, the holding reported aggregate sales of about RON282.7m (€60.6m), according to the latest available figures. This was up 20% compared with a year earlier.

The Romanian holding was created in 1992 through the privatisation of a state-owned meat processing company.