Reliance Consumer to pour ₹8,000 crore into soft drinks business

Time of India

7 hours ago

New Delhi:
Reliance
will invest up to Rs 8,000 crore on capacity expansion of Campa and other beverage brands in its portfolio over the next 12-15 months, people directly aware of the development said.
Mukesh Ambani-owned
Reliance Consumer Products
(RCPL) is adding nearly 10-12 new greenfield and co-packing plants to step up its challenge not only against larger rivals
Coca-Cola
and PepsiCo, but also against dozens of low-priced regional brands across the country, one of the executives said. The proposed capex investment is the largest yet by RCPL, which started operations in 2022 as a wholly owned subsidiary of Reliance Retail Ventures.
"The capex is being done on a combined investment of Rs 6,000-8,000 crore by Reliance and some of its partners," said the executive cited above.
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In February, Reliance set up a plant in Guwahati along with local partner Jericho Foods and Beverages LLP to manufacture soft drinks and water, and cater to the Northeast region. Another facility is coming up in Bihar.
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The FMCG company's beverages portfolio includes
Campa Cola
, Orange and Lemon, Sosyo soft drinks, Spinner sports drink, Sun Crush juice, fruit-based hydration brand RasKik, and Independence water.
Reliance Consumer has partnered with former Sri Lankan cricketer Muttiah Muralitharan to co-create, manufacture and sell Spinner sports drinks at Rs 10 for 250 ml bottles, less than half the price of rivals such as PepsiCo-owned Gatorade and Sting.
So far, Campa and other beverages are being manufactured in 18 plants, all of which are co-investments.
The company also makes and sells Sil jam and spreads, confectionery brands Lotus Chocolate, Toffeeman and Ravalgaon, Alan's Bugles snacks, Velvette shampoo, and self-created brands such as Independence staples. Most of its 15 brands are acquired.
Availability of its brands, however, is currently restricted to select markets. An email sent to RCPL remained unanswered until press time Wednesday.
The company wants to ensure its consumer portfolio is available nationally by March 2027, with about 70% availability by March next year for categories such as beverages, its director T Krishnakumar had told ET in an exclusive interview last month.
"For any product to be scaled in an intense manner, you need 24-30 months, because anything less than that, you can't do a decent job," he had said.
RCPL is following a strategy of focusing on "600 million consumers at the mass end and working closely with neighbourhood stores by giving them margins at today's cost," Krishnakumar had said in the interview.
Reliance has priced its cola, sports, hydration and juice drinks at about 20-40% lower than Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Tata Consumer Products and Dabur, forcing the incumbents to accelerate consumers promotions, trade margins, and introducing more smaller, lower priced packs selectively.
The ongoing summer season, though, has been severely impacted on account of unseasonal rains and early onset of monsoon.
According to think tank ICRIER, India's beverages industry, which includes carbonated soft drinks, juices and water, is estimated at Rs 67,000 crore and expected to touch sales of Rs 1.47 lakh crore in sales by 2030.
In FY25, RCPL reported revenue of Rs 11,500 crore, with Campa and Independence crossing Rs 1,000 crore each in sales. The brands' overall reach crossed one million stores last fiscal, the company said in its earnings report.