Cott Expands South of the Border
Reuters reports that Toronto-based Cott Corp. is taking a 90 percent stake in a joint venture with Mexican bottler Embotelladora de Puebla, S.A. de C.V, a privately held supplier of retailer brand carbonated soft drinks.
Cott will manage the new venture, Cott Embotelladores de Mexico, S.A. de C.V., which will manufacture soft drinks for several grocery retailers in Mexico including Comercial Mexicana, Chedraui and Wal-Mart.
Moderator Comment: Should retailers increase, decrease or keep about the same the space devoted to private label soft drinks?
Obviously, there are store-by-store variables depending
on consumer base and other factors. That said, we often wonder if retailers
(and consumers) wouldn’t be better served if space was opened up for unique
products/flavors by other brand suppliers. This could be accomplished by cutting
back space on slow moving private label or national brand duplicates of major
CSD segments such as cola. [George Anderson – Moderator]