Distillery "Visant" moved to Khokholsky district and changes owner

The Visant company announced the completion of the transfer of the Visant distillery from the center of Voronezh to the Khokholsky district, which cost it $1 million. At the same time, the process of changing ownership is being completed - the new owner of the enterprise will be the general director of the Ilmen distillery, Alikhan Sagov. In 2008, the plant intends to double its capacity and produce up to 50 thousand deciliters of products per month. Now nothing prevents Visant from selling the vacant plot or implementing a development project there. Vladimir Subbotin, general director of the Visant distillery, yesterday spoke about the completion of the transfer of all lines from Koltsovskaya Street (the center of Voronezh) to the village of Gremyache (Khokholsky district), where almost two years ago the production of the Voronezh winery was transferred from Kukolkin Street (the site was sold to OJSC "Construction and financial group"). “The distillery is ready to reach its design capacity by the end of the year, but is already operating at 50 percent efficiency,” explained Mr. Subbotin, adding that it cost $1 million to move the distillery. In 2008, the company intends to increase production volumes from 25 thousand to 50 thousand deciliters per month. As the general director of the distillery clarified, the assortment will remain the same, and the Visant company is already considering options for implementing a development project on the former site.

Until recently, the Visant distillery was part of the Visant corporation (legally a non-profit partnership), created in 2002 and uniting more than 12 enterprises. According to Rosstat, turnover for January-November 2007 amounted to 324 million rubles, production volume - 187 thousand deciliters. A co-owner of a number of the corporation's assets is regional Duma deputy Sergei Tkachev. As former first vice-governor Sergei Naumov admitted, he owns a share in Visant-torg CJSC, a franchisee of the Pyaterochka chain of stores (18 stores in Voronezh). It is known from Mr. Naumov that the distillery is in the process of changing ownership. Its new owner will be the general director of the Ilmen distillery, Alikhan Sagov. “After the transfer of production, we were faced with two difficulties: forced downtime, which, however, did not entail interruptions in the supply of alcohol at retail, and more complicated logistics. From the center of Voronezh, the products from the plant arrived at the Visant-opt wholesale base, which occupies about 40% of the Voronezh alcohol market, directly along the conveyor belt. Now transport and time costs have been added, which are aggravated by the lack of a railway line,” noted Vladimir Subbotin, adding that a number of advantages cover the shortcomings and make it possible to maintain profitability at 8-10%. “We drilled our own well to obtain drinking water, as a result we saved on water fees and improved its quality. In addition, the site in the center of Voronezh did not allow us to expand production,” the general director emphasized.

Ilya Tverdokhleb, development director of the Grafskaya Sloboda trading house, one of the leaders in the Voronezh wholesale alcohol market, noted that despite all the advantages of relocating production, the main difficulty remains forced downtime. “At different times, both the Buturlinovsky distillery and Visant had to stop the lines, as a result they lost about half of their market shares, which they were subsequently unable to restore,” explained Mr. Tverdokhleb, adding that in the context of the all-Russian trend If federal brands supplant regional brands, a stop in production is fraught with the fact that even with the doubling of capacity that Visant declares, it will hardly be possible to seriously increase its share.

The head of the National Alcohol Association, Pavel Shapkin, believes that the Visant company itself can use the site in the city center more profitably: “Selling the site at a good price or implementing a development project will bring more dividends.” He added that the increase in Visant production volumes will not affect the Russian market unless professional distributors are interested in the distillery, as happened with the Ulyanovsk Kristall distillery. True, after he became part of the GROSS Alcohol Plants group.

Olga Alexandrova

Kommersant (Voronezh) No. 233 dated 12/18/2007

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