Amrut Distilleries: World Cheers & Crowns It The Best! Liquor Industry Premiumization & Financials

Rakshay, thank you very much for your time where we all know, I mean, AMRUT is making headlines globally as well as back home in India. We can't hear you though. You may want to just unmute yourself. I understand what kind of, yes, we can, yes, we can. So how are the numbers looking right now? You, you're getting such a lot of praise globally. Consumers are loving the product here back home. It's also AMRUT is making waves. How are the numbers stacking up right now? Well, the entire aspect of Indian single malt whiskey globally has picked up really well. Recently at the International Spirits Challenge competition, Amrut won five gold medals. It's never been done before by any single Indian distler at a single event. So we have the Amrut Fusion, Amrut Amalgam, we have the Amrut Nativity, Amrut Kasprinth and Peter Kasprin. These are the five variants of amber single mark whiskey that won five gold medals at last month's International Spirits Challenge. But having said that, the category itself, premiumization is doing exceedingly well in India and abroad. So especially in India, the concept of Indian single mods, you know, we have Amrut Rampur, Paul John or Indri, Gyan Chand and the host of other malls are going to follow suit. So yes, it's interesting time within the premium and luxury segment in the alcoholic space in India, please. So Rakshay, what is your own foresight right now in the next two to three years? Do you think this premiumization trend is going to continue? And will you continue to see the kind of volume uptake that you have in the last three years? Yes, ma'am, absolutely. I think the volume uptake will increase. I think consumers today are, have have graduated to premiumization, drinking better quality alcohol. That's what the trend that we see today. I think that's the same trajectory and growth as far as luxury category in the spirits segment in India will, will continue to grow in the coming years as well. Please. Yes, numbers are you doing right now. We understand you're also in the process setting up a new distillery. What kind of numbers do you have in mind in terms of aspiration since the demand is picking up so fast? Yeah. Currently as far as the case goods are concerned, the 9 litre cases we are currently doing in, in our luxury whiskey segment, we are doing close to 120,000 cases as of last year we touched. And this year we expect to grow by about 15 to 20%. You're absolutely right. We have now taken up ambitious span of expanding our distillery here in Bangalore itself, where we'll be increasing the production capacity by another 50%. So going forward, I think the demand for AMRUT in India and globally is, is set to grow that AMRUT would be enjoying very good margins. What's the average pricer bottle which you're talking about four or five of them? And how are the margins in this segment? Well, the margins in the luxury space are certainly are better and obviously in comparison to the economy and the prestige and deluxe categories that we have within India. If you're as you know, alcohol is a state subject in our country. Each state has their own taxation system. So the MRPS tend to vary from state to state. Currently, if you take a product like Amruth Fusion which retails in Bangalore for a bottle is about ₹4400, they have same product retails in in the Maharashtra say Bombay for about 5200 and retails in Haryana in Gurgaon for about 3200. So you know, the, the, the taxation system is completely different in our country. So I think the average price of a single malt whiskey, especially Amrut is can take it anywhere between 303 four 3 1/2 thousand to ₹3800. Please just to clarify that there's no concern when it comes to inflationary raw material price concerns on your margins, right? No, ma'am. I think inflation has been a concern, especially as far as the base raw material Martin Bali is concerned. Pre pandemic, the rate has almost doubled now and we were purchasing at about about 80 to 30 to ₹30,000 a tonne amounted value. Today it's 64 to ₹65,000 a tonne. So it's virtually doubled. So no matter in which category you are, whether you're the economic category or the deluxe of prestige category, even in the luxury category, the, the cost push is so high for Indian distillers today. Even even in the luxury segment, we are feeling the pinch now. Yes, please. You know, you're doing so well, the company products are selling well, you're expanding capacities. Are you, you're, you're also a listed unlisted company, right? Are you, you know, planning to hit the street anytime going forward? Are you being approached by investors to pick up stake or something of that sort? Or you want to, you know, you are interested in remaining unlisted for now. At the moment, it's a closely held family concern and of course, there's a lot of interest in AMRUT itself. The board, family board, is yet to take a call on whether we should go public. But having said that, I think we might have to bite that bullet and probably in the most stable future, probably within a year or two, I think we should keep our options open in going public in the street, please. Yeah. Excellent. So in one or two years, you're open to going public and are being approached by investors. Why not the product? I mean, it all comes down. It's like, you know, if the product is good, then investors will definitely come and queue up. Thanks very much, Rakshit, for your time today in discussing the road ahead for the company. If you like this video then like, share and subscribe to ET Now.