Established on the African continent for several decades, the Castel Group has announced the sale of two brands and mineral water bottling plants in order to focus on its core business: beer production. As a result, the AWA and CRISTALINE brands will disappear from the Ivorian market. These two brands were nevertheless very popular in Côte d'Ivoire…
As a reminder, Castel has been marketing the AWA and CRISTALINE brands in the mineral water segment in Côte d'Ivoire since the 2000s through its subsidiary Société de limonaderies d'Afrique (Solibra). The two brands are now owned by the local SDTM group, which belongs to Carré d'Or.
This announcement is not an isolated one, as the French group is also planning to sell its assets in Cameroon, where it is represented in the mineral water segment by Société des eaux minérales du Cameroun (SEMC), a subsidiary of Société anonyme des Boissons du Cameroun (SABC). In addition to Cameroon, the group is currently in the process of ceasing its water bottling activities in Morocco, with plans to do the same in Burkina Faso and Benin. The sale of the brands and the Ivorian bottling plant in the mineral water segment comes at a time when the group is posting mixed results and successive losses on its activities.
For the beer giant, however, this announcement is part of an overall strategy to refocus its activities on beer, the most widely consumed alcoholic beverage on the African continent. Castel remains the leading beer producer in the French-speaking region, with a presence across the continent in soft drinks, animal feed, and flour. Castel has also strengthened its position in the beer market in Cameroon in particular, with the acquisition in 2022 of Guinness Cameroon S.A. from the British beverage group Diageo. The group now produces and distributes Guinness Cameroon S.A. (GCSA) beers, mixed alcoholic beverages, and malt drinks throughout Cameroon under brand licensing agreements.
The Société Anonyme des Brasseries du Cameroun (SABC), created just after the Second World War and a subsidiary of the Castel Group, which markets both local brands such as Manyan and Castel, and international brands such as 33 Export, Mutzig, Amstel, and Pelforth, dominates the market and already accounts for three-quarters of consumption across all brands. By acquiring Guinness, which represents nearly 15% of the market, the Castel Group now enjoys a virtual monopoly in Cameroon, even though the Cameroonian market saw the arrival of a new entrant at the end of June 2022 with the first beer from Brasserie Samuel Foyou (Brasaf) and the Union des Brasseries du Cameroun (UBC), which markets the Kadji beer, K44, and King beer brands. A formidable competitor…