Russia: Vena to hit Yekaterinburg beer market with double force
Chelyabinsk brewery Vena has celebrated the end of a project aiming to double its brewing capacities, which was made possible only after merging with Baltika, Yarpivo and Pikra - the leaders of the Russian beer market.
The Russian beer market is nowadays among the most interesting beer markets of the world. Beer consumption has doubled in the last two decades. In the early 80, a Russian was drinking 25 liters/year on average. Today, beer consumption progressed up to 60 liters/year for a person. Moscow and Saint Petersburg lead the way with indicators closed to the European beer drinking standards 80-90 liters of beer for a person annually.
Meanwhile, the Russian beer market is actively evolving. This is proved by a solid consolidation of brewing capacities in the hands of few active players: 80% of the local beer market is controlled by 5 big breweries. The reasons for this consolidation are: generally beer industry locates in districts, hence they try to reduce logistics and production costs.
According to Baltika Chairman Anton Artemiev, beer production will be sufficient to enlarge its presence in Ural capital, Yekaterinburg, where Heineken-owned Patra has a strong position to defend. At this moment, Baltika controls 26% of Yekaterinburg beer market, but we intend to increase sales and to bring them up to our general Russian beer market share which is nearly 35%, Atemiev said.
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