adminBusiness Reporter
ARENEL says it will soon introduce its mahewu beverages onto the market as part of a diversification strategy aimed at boosting its business operations.
Mahewu is a popular African traditional drink made from fermented maize, sorghum or millet mealie-meal with sugar.
The company’s managing director, Joshua Lepar, said the installation of the $2.5 million mahewu plant was at an advanced stage.
He, however, said the company had temporarily shelved plans to construct an estimated $2 million purpose-built production facility to house a new enlarged biscuit factory together with an automated plant.
“The mahewu plant is underway, progressing according to plan and on schedule. As we see the plant being installed and the packaging being completed, we’re getting very excited about this new project and the potential to bolt it onto the Arenel brand of which we’re very proud,” Lepar said.
He said despite the growing number of companies involved in mahewu production, the country’s largest biscuit and sweet manufacturer would utilise its innovativeness to grab a large market niche.
“Yes the number of companies either manufacturing or importing mahewu has grown, and this excites us even more as there’s obviously a high demand for the product in the country. We believe that with our state-of-the-art bottling plant and production capacity, we’ll be able to compete in this market against the old traditional players as well as all the new comers,” said Lepar.
“We’re going to give the consuming public a great product in the usual mahewu flavours but will also be bringing out exciting new flavours as well. This will take place as we entrench ourselves in the market and as the mahewu consumers acknowledge and trust our ability to give them a great product at affordable prices, as we’ve done with all other Arenel products.”
He said the company was satisfied with the performance of its new product, Yummies biscuits on the market.
Yummies comes in five flavours namely chocolate, vanilla, and tropical banana, sweet orange and tangy lemon.
“We’re currently running a school promotion for the youth in conjunction with our sponsorship of the National Association of School Heads under 17 soccer tournament 2015 and have linked Yummies with that youth promotion.
“We’re most encouraged and delighted to receive letters and even poems about this new range. These favourable comments from the school goers give us the inspiration to introduce even more new products,” Lepar said.
Londile Moyo
Bongani Ndlovu