Indian Retailer

Bisleri International Pvt. Ltd, which claims to be the market leader in India’s packaged water industry, is in talks with beverage makers and bottlers in countries such as Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Oman and the United Arab Emirates to franchise its brand name “Bisleri”.

“We are in talks with several players and would finalize some of them very shortly,” said Anjana Ghosh, director, Bisleri, which recently began exporting packaged water to Singapore. She said she was eyeing markets with large Indian diaspora to cash in on the 45-year-old brand’s recall value. “Water is a bulky product...so the best thing is to make it locally. But the most important thing is to find the right partner.”

As per industry research body Beverage Marketing Corp.’s 2008 estimates, Asia consumes 26.2% of total packaged and mineral water produced, while West Asia consumes 3.5%.

Retail consultants said going international was the ideal growth model for a company that expects a turnover of Rs600 crore for 2009-10 fiscal, “Getting the right international partners and franchising is a good way as it does not even require capital investment,” said Purnendu Kumar, associate vice-president of retail consultancy Technopak Advisors Pvt. Ltd.

Bisleri is also looking aggressively at domestic growth After launching mineral water brand Vedica recently, it is test marketing flavoured water in Mumbai. “It should be in the market this summer,” Ghosh said.