Speaking at this year’s Distributors’ Awards, held over the weekend in Lagos, the company’s Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Mr Jordi Borrut Bel argued that the challenging economic times in Nigeria have continued to pose serious threat to businesses and consumers’ purchasing power.
“Today’s consumers no longer want to pay more for something they can pay less for. Their purchasing powers are being daily affected, because of the trying economic times. And we are also aware of the increasing threats of competition in the market we are in.
“But we are ready for such competition. We are ready for the fight. We are ready to maintain our hold and dominance in the nation’s beer market, despite the challenging times and the obvious threats from competition,” he stated.
He attributed the company’s successes and exploits over the years to its trade partners’ hardwork, diligence and the long-term relationship spanning over seven decades, that the company has established with the Nigerian consumers.
The NB Plc boss explained that the decision to organise the award ceremony was informed by the need to celebrate the trade partners for their unwavering loyalty and commitment to the company in the past one year.
While assuring the trade partners of the company’s support, Jordi however stressed the need for them to do more by making the consumers their key focus.
“The focus this time around is about our boss, the consumer. He is the one that opens the bottles. We want to go into the market and listen to them. And we believe we are going to win this together. We’ll build this relationship with the consumer together,” he stated.
Commending the trade partners for their sales performances in 2017, the company’s Sales Director, Mr Uche Unigwe, explained that the event was designed for the company’s trade partners since they form “the most important route to the market.”
He argued that the trade partners, comprising of the transporters and distributors, had played very key roles in ensuring that the company still retains its dominance of both the alcoholic and non-alcoholic markets in the country for the past seven decades.
“We are here to celebrate our stars, to celebrate our distributors, the most important route to the market, the best the industry can offer.
“We are here to celebrate our transporters who move millions of cases to our different breweries all over the country; to celebrate those transporters who control N37 million worth of investments on a daily basis. When you imagine the scope of job our transporters do for us, coupled with that of our distributors, we cannot but celebrate this class of people,” he stated.
He explained that the awardees, from different parts of the country, were being rewarded for their outstanding sales performances in the last one year.
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