Delmege Distributors post record results

Delmege Distributors, a subsidiary of the Delmege Forsyth Group of Companies and one of Sri Lanka's leaders in the marketing of branded packaged food products, specializing in retail and wholesale distribution, felicitated their staff at the Company's annual Awards Night recently.

Winner of the Chairman’s Trophy for the Most Outstanding Sales Rep for 2008/2009 W.M.A.W. Wijesundara receiving his award from F.G.N. Mendis, Chairman Delmege Group. Kosala Dissanayake MD, DF&Co left and Dinesh Nalliah CEO DDPL (right) look on.

In his review of the year just concluded the CEO of DDPL Dinesh Nalliah said that "double digit inflation, loss of volumes, lower than budget achievements, reduction of incentives to staff, this is probably how the last financial year gets described in many fora; however, for DDPL, the year 2008/09 can be described as one of excellent performances".

DDPL's turnover grew by 25% over the year 2007/2008 whilst the net profit for the year was more than double the amount budgeted.

"To be precise, we exceeded the profit objective by 121% and for having achieved this outstanding performance the entire staff was rewarded with an incentive trip to Thailand" said Managing Director, Kosala Dissanayake.

The awards given were, best performance for Motha, won by Leonard Bastian from the Negombo sales territory, best performance for Delmege Canned Fish won by W.M.A.W. Wijesundara from the Bandarawela sales territory, best performance for Delmege Essences and Colourings won by Mahesh Kumara from Modern Trade, best performance for Delmege Water won by G.G.N. Nawarathna from the Peradeniya sales territory, and best performance for Delmege Supiri Soy won by A. Kaduruwewa of Modern Trade. The best Sales Region was the Uva region, whilst the Nominated Dealer of the year was Carmel Perera of Wattala. The most prestigious award, the Chairman's Trophy for the Most Outstanding Sales Representative of the Year was won by W.M.A.W. Wijesundara of Bandarawela.

During the year under review, DDPL consolidated the market positions of their flagship brands Delmege and canned fish whilst strengthening the company's own brand business.

"Delmege canned fish volumes grew despite industry volumes declining on account of the global shortage that prevailed for almost the entire year". Nalliah attributed this to the fact that they were able to keep their supply chain serviced due to the company's established suppliers, namely Pesquera San Jose servicing all of their orders due to the long relationship DDPL enjoyed with them, along with their ability to source products from alternate markets. "We also consolidated the brand's presence in both the modern trade as well as traditional trade channels" he said. Household favourite Motha continued to dominate the dessert category, while DDPL's endeavours to grow the jelly category by launching a 'non-ref' jelly at an affordable price paid ample dividends, with overall jelly volumes growing significantly and Motha continuing to retain its position as the 1st choice brand of ingredients for the cake making industry. The other products under the Delmege umbrella brand such as soya, noodles, and water too, generated volume growths over the previous year. Nalliah said that all these brands were driven by distribution initiatives aimed at increasing width of distribution.

"During the year 2008/2009, we launched two different product offerings of tea under the Delmege brand with a view to further strengthening our own brand business. The company also made a significant move with regard to product portfolio management when we diversified out of packaged food and entered the stationery business with the launch of exercise books under the Rathna brand name".

The focused effort made during the year on developing the Delmege brand portfolio generated excellent results with the Delmege brand portfolio contributing to the majority portion of the company's turnover.

"The current year, 2009/10 has seen DDPL obtaining the Milgro dairy business by being appointed as sole distributor for Sri Lanka by Pacific Inter-Link of Malaysia.

Given the size and importance of the Milgro business, it is being handled under a separate profit centre, namely Delmege Marketing (Pvt) Ltd", said Group CEO, Dilhan de Silva.

"With the addition of the Milgro business, Delmege is now among the top FMCG companies in Sri Lanka", said De Silva, who attributed the results achieved during year 2008/2009 to the excellent team effort made by the staff who had a clear focus on the goals to be achieved.