Vietnam. Foreign brewers are crowding out local producers

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Despite the fact that in 2015 Sabeco produced 1.38 billion liters of beer, the experts say very little growth of the company. Meanwhile, Heineken was able, for the very first time, to outstrip Habeco and to take the second place in the beer market of Vietnam.

According to Mr. Phan Dang Tuat, the former chairman of Sabeco, the competition in the industry is becoming tougher, so breweries have to struggle for every outlet in both large and small cities. Sabeco plans to hire experts to back about 800 outlets.

The difficulty is the fact that in foreign companies such specialists earn $ 4000-5000, but Sabeco is able to pay 40-50 million dong ($ 1800-2300) per month. And most importantly, that the projects of foreign companies are implemented rather rapidly, whereas the local breweries need more time to do it.

The building a united team is also an important goal of Nguyen Thi Nga, CEO of the trading company Habeco. According to him, the company needs to instantly take into account changes in the market.

Apart from foreign competitors Carlsberg and Heineken, which have long been present in Vietnam, there are new companies in the market such as Sapporo (Japan), AB InBev (USA), Shingha (Thailand). The latter purchased 25% of shares of Masan and had the opportunity to build a brewery with a capacity of 100 million litres per year.

Becoming a company with 100% foreign capital, Sapporo has expanded its dealer network. In May 2015, in Vietnam AB InBev built a brewery with a capacity of 50 million litres and plans to expand it to 100 million litres. It is expected that the brewery will provide beer to Vietnamese consumers.

The competition in the global beer market is becoming very tough, and only large companies that provide good service and have a strong sales team, can win.