Excelent eyes wafer market

Chocolate producer Excelent Bucharest plans to enter the wafer market in the medium term, chief executive Sorin Alexandrescu said on Tuesday. “Wafers are a complementary product to what we are making now. Excelent already has the logistics capacity to justify this decision. Wafers belong to a product category that is not exploited as much as the market would like it to be,” explained the Excelent chief executive. Current wafer companies on the market include Nestle, which is the market leader with its Joe brand, European Drinks with the Natty brand, and Alka. The market is estimated at about $40 million a year. “We are not intimidated by the multinationals and can match their promotion investments,” added Alexandrescu. Excelent currently accounts for more than 35% of the domestic chocolate market and its main competitor is Kraft Foods, which markets Poiana and Milka chocolate. ZF