Zest-O plans to put up plants overseas

Homegrown beverage manufacturer Zest-O Corp. is considering acquiring a production facility in the United States, where it has already established a considerable presence.

Zest-O, according to company chair Alfredo M. Yao, is also keen on setting up manufacturing plants in the Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) where it targets to expand its reach.

Yao said the company had long been planning to produce Zesto and other juice products in the US, which is one of the company’s biggest markets, to reduce transport and logistics costs. The company started exporting its beverage products to the US about seven to eight years ago, he added.

“The US is a big market and our products cater not only to the Filipino community there but also other markets. Our strategy was to start distributing our tropical fruit juices there and then go into mainstream products later. We have earlier considered exporting puree to the US and manufacturing our products there,” he said.

“We’re looking at one existing plant in the US. We’re bottling the RC Cola here from the US, and our partner there, Royal Crown, has a plant similar to our Zesto plant here, so we’re looking at that now. We’re currently in talks with them,” Yao said.

Yao is the chair of Asiawide Refreshment Corp., which holds an exclusive license from RC Cola USA to manufacture and distribute RC Cola in the Philippines.

According to Yao, there are a number of options Zest-O can either acquire or lease the RC Cola plant in the US, or it can form a joint venture with RC Cola.

He said the company was also looking to expand more aggressively within the Asean this year.

“The year 2015 will be a busy year for our company, for both Zesto and RC Cola. We have been exporting Zesto to Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand over the last three years. This year, we will also bring RC Cola [to other countries in Asean],” Yao said.

“If we see bigger export volumes in those countries, then we will have to put up plants there as it is more expensive to export from here. Ours is a low cost product so we cannot continue exporting from here because of logistics cost,” he added.