Riston Tea launched in Sri Lanka

by Sapumali GALAGODA

Riston Tea, a well-known brand for tea in the Russian Federation launched its tea in Sri Lanka last week.

UK Beverages (Pvt) Ltd is the local counterpart servicing the Riston brand as the supplier of Ceylon Tea and its owner Nishantha Perera is a Sri Lankan by birth. The company has a factory at Peliyagoda with a capacity of shipping 20-30 high quadrant 40ft containers of tea per month.

The factory has all infrastructure including a tea bagging and packing plant. Over 40 persons are employed in the local operation. The Riston Tea Group employs over 450 persons in Russia as well.

Riston Tea is packed in Russia and in Sri Lanka. It uses 95 percent of pure Ceylon tea in its range of products. Riston's turnover in 2010 exceeded USD 67 million and the forecast for 2011 is USD 80 million. The annual marketing budget of Riston over the last few years has averaged over USD seven million.

Russia and Commonwealth Independent States (CIS) are the largest and most important market for Ceylon tea. For the year 2010 over 77.2 thousand metric tons have been exported to these countries which amounts to 25 percent of the entire country's total tea exports each year.

"Today most Russians prefer the rich and strong taste of Ceylon teas to the subtle and exquisite flavour of teas from China or any other tea exporter in the world. Riston Tea is in a unique position ranking among the four key players in the Russian market", said Chairman, Riston Tea Nishantha Perera.

With an initial investment of USD 25 million Riston Tea has now become the leading Sri Lankan tea brand in the trading segment of the Russian Federation and plans are underway to grow the investment to more than double that figure in the medium term. According to figures released by AC Neilson, Riston is in the foremost position ahead in terms of market share with 6.4 percent share value in the trade analysis of 24 cities over all Sri Lankan owned tea brands sold in the Russian market.