Angelli bets on exports

Astese Production, the producer and distributor of Angelli sparkling wines on the Romanian market, aims to penetrate the Western markets. Consequently, it has launched exports to Greece and is preparing for Switzerland.

“We operate regular exports to Greece, and we are about to finalise the contracts for the Swiss market. It is quite difficult to penetrate Western markets, since we are coping, on one hand, with an image deficit as regards Romanian products, and, on the other hand, we are competing with products that are much cheaper than ours and that already have a foothold on the market,” said Marius Obritenschi, the company”s marketing manager.

Obritenschi would not reveal the value of exports, saying that, for the time being, the amounts are not significant.

This is the company”s first big exit on Western markets, as, so far, Astese Production had only sporadically exported products to Serbia.

According to the company officials, the production capacity exceeds 25 million bottles per annum.

“For the time being, we are producing below capacity, since domestic consumption is much smaller than the production potential. A solution to this problem would also be to raise the share of exports,” Obritenschi added.

The company posted 5% higher turnover in H1 on the corresponding period of last year. Astese registered turnover worth more than 11m euros in 2004, 10% higher than in 2003.