Angola gets into the spirit – with KWV

It’s as home grown as biltong and buchu yet leading international wine and brandy producer, KWV, is relatively new to Southern Africa despite its solid reputation on the continent. This continent, with more than one billion people in 53 countries, is indeed one of three major strategic growth objectives for the Paarlbased company – along with Latin America and the Far East. Even so, Werner Swanepoel, KWV’s brand director, spirits, and acting sales director, admits increasing market share in Africa will be no meander through the vineyards. “Expanding here is no easy task but all multi-national companies are looking to Africa so we see great opportunities, particularly starting in sub-Saharan African countries like Angola, Mozambique and Zimbabwe. “Taking all our portfolios into account, we are playing at different levels, but our overall focus is really to move into more westernised ‘expat’ areas in the different countries, the more affluent on-premises retail outlets such as hotels, restaurants, cafes and clubs already with considerable alcohol consumption, especially wine.” Around 10% of KWV’s wine production will be exported to Africa this year. Swanepoel notes fairly significant annual spirits consumption with imported brands included in countries such as Angola, Kenya, Nigeria and Mozambique. KWV has over many years carved an enviable reputation for quality fortified and unfortified wines and brandies, recognised in Africa and far and wide, but the company’s forward-march strategy will take cognisance of a number of major factors in seeking to enlarge its footprint. Derrick Wallace, KWV’s sales executive for Africa, believes an advantage for the group is that many African consumers have travelled to international markets and thus been exposed to the company’s products. “KWV has been trading in Africa for much longer than in Southern Africa and the approach has always been to build our trade (with Africa) on brands such as KWV wines, Roodeberg and Pearly Bay, and brandies, and to avoid any dumping, which tends to be an attractive practice for other international liquor producers.” That said, and given that the current generation of African consumers is ageing, KWV will be out to win the hearts, minds and palates of younger consumers, many of whom may well be ignorant of brands on offer. The company will also be mindful that Africans are historically mainly beer drinkers, with local (home country) produced spirits a close second. And although steady growth has been experienced in wine consumption, reds predominantly, the entry level trend is toward sweeter wines. “There is also a swing from locally produced spirits to internationally recognised brands, and KWV regards this as an opportunity to build a brand footprint for its renowned, awardwinning, brandies,” says Wallace. That much was acknowledged by the many accolades at the recent Veritas Awards, the longestrunning and most prestigious wine competition in South Africa which included brandy judging for the first time. Today, KWV enjoys around 8% of brandy and 2.5% of wine market share in South Africa, much of the latter’s gratifying successes attributed to KWV’s Australian chief winemaker, Richard Rowe. The company is pitching its Pearly Bay range at Africa, already popular in countries like Mozambique, also the Golden Kaan export range. New to KWV, with high hopes of winning over sweet-tooth consumers in Africa, Latin America and elsewhere, is Wild Africa Cream, a caramel-based liqueur in a distinctive leopard skin print bottle. Many African markets are ‘out of bounds’ by virtue of their huge Muslim populations but KWV has come up with a non-alcoholic sparkling wine under the Pearly Bay label, which is exported into Africa and may also land up in the Caribbean, again with a sizeable Muslim population. KWV’s brands are available in 35 markets through an excellent distribution network that includes shareholdings in several international companies, none African-based, although the company is well represented by a dozen or so importers.