'We understand the value of a green environment'

In a candid chat with Restaurant India, Dhirendra Singh, MD, Manpasand Beverages Pvt Ltd, talks about Indian beverage market, the fruit juice business, growth drivers of such business and also about his expansion plan.

How big is the Indian beverage market? What is the market share of fruit juice alone?

The Indian non-alcoholic market is currently estimated to be around Rs 50,000 crore which includes mineral water, fruit juices, soft drinks, dairy drinks and hot beverages among others. The fruit juice market is roughly around 10 percent of the Indian non-alcoholic beverages market and is expected to grow by 35-40 percent in near future.

Compared to Parle, Coca Cola and Hershey’s, how different is Manpasand Beverages?

Manpasand is India’s fastest growing fruit juice company and has carved a niche for itself with a strong presence in the Tier-2 and semi-rural and rural markets in India. Its flagship brand ‘Mango Sip’ is amongst the top four mango juice brands in India.

Compared to Manpasand Beverages, Coca-Cola is predominantly into aerated soft drinks, i.e. Thums Up, Sprite, Coca-Cola, Fanta and mineral water, while Hershey’s only focused on milk-based beverages like chocolate and other flavoured milk. Parle Agro on the other side is focused on fruit juice industry with products including Frooti. Its other popular products include Appy Fizz, LMN and Grapo Fizz.  

What is the contribution of Manpasand to the fruit juice market? How do you see the sector in next five years?

There is tremendous scope of growth in the fruit drink market to be specific. In the coming five years, we expect the industry to be around Rs 12, 00- 15,000 crore.

We started Manpasand Beverages in the year 1998, and in just 15 years of operations, company’s turnover has crossed Rs 240 crore during financial year 2012-13 with strong growth rate of 35-40 percent per annum.

What works as a growth catalyst for this segment?

Emerging trends like increased preference on wellness, the desire to spend extra on health and maintaining healthy lifestyle especially in the middle class and the strengthening Indian economy, which offers more disposable income to the masses, are major catalysts that drives strong growth of the non-alcoholic beverage market in India

How do you keep your juice fresh?  How is the packaging done?

Health and hygiene go hand-in-hand when we talk about commercially available fruit juices. That is to say, juices will be healthy only when they are prepared in a hygienic way. All branded fruit juice players stringently follow the healthy standards set by associations.

High-speed PET bottle lines and tetra pack lines are installed at multiple locations at our manufacturing plants to maintain consistency in the quality and taste of our products. Our self-sustained R&D departments at all plants also assist us in maintaining higher standards of hygiene and cleanliness to ensure highest standards of food safety in all its products.

We understand the value of a green environment and give utmost importance to protecting it. We use aseptic packaging and pet bottles. The rectangular aseptic packages are highly efficient during transportation, storage and distribution and consume 33 percent lesser space than cans. Aseptic packaging is not only recyclable but it also enables us to reduce the carbon footprint. Apart from this, we persistently work towards maintaining a positive water balance for which we have set up zero waste water discharge systems in our plants.

Brief us about your expansion plans in smaller towns and cities?

We have aggressive expansion plans to significantly increase our manufacturing capacity and distribution reach across the country, especially in rural and semi-rural regions. We plan to invest over Rs 100 crore in next one year to increase production capacities from 60,000 cases per day to 1.5 lakh cases per day (1 case = 24 bottles).

How do you manage to distribute your products across 20 states through a network of two lakh retailers? How do you contact retailers to sell your product?

We have a strong network of stockists, dealers and distributors. Manpasand believes in appointing channel partners, not dealers. Hence, company does in-depth analysis of any dealership inquiry before finalising the same on its location, reach, network, his area of operation before selecting a business partner.

Through the co-ordinated efforts, Manpasand is being able to reach out to over 2 lakh retailers in 20 states through network of our 2000 distributors and 200 super stockists.

Is there any plan to launch any new Manpasand product?

In near future, we plan to add more fruit-based beverages to our current product basket of 25 variants. Big plans to foray into mineral water, nectars, pure juices and snacks business are also in the pipeline.