Lager wars: Who wins?

By JOHNMARK UKOKO

Nigeria has many lager beer producing companies, some have been in existence for over 50 years while others are quite new in existence in the country.

Some of these companies that have over the years churned out millions, if not billions of bottles of beer to Nigerian drinkers are: Nigeria Breweries Plc, Guinness Nigeria Plc, Consolidated Brewery, Bendel Breweries, Life Breweries, Golden Guinea Brewery, Umuahia, Abia State.

Others are Sona BreweryOtta, Kwara Brewery, Plateau Brewery, and some other breweriesoperating in the country.

Recent global report has it that Nigerians are some of the top drinkers of beer, next to the Germans who over the years have remained number one beer drinkers in the world.

Some of the popular local lager brands produced by the local companies are, Guinness stout, Legend stout,Heneiken, Harp larger, Star lager, 33 larger, Trophy lager, Life lager, Hero lager, and a host of other lager beer brands consumed by the old and young across the country.

The popularity of some of these brands have fetched their companies billions of naira on a yearly basis, as the quoted companies among them consistently post huge trading figures.

For many years, Nigerian Breweries Plc and Guinness Nigeria Plc were the most capitalized companies in Nigeria and post huge profits for their shareholders on a yearly basis.

Despite the fact that Nigeria has the lagest numbers of religious houses in the world, many of which abhor the drinking of lager beer, the figures posted by National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), showed that Nigerians consumed millions of bottles of lager beer on a daily basis, while night clubs, hotels, brothels, and hangout locations across the country daily play host to lager beer drinkers.

While the male folks are the major drinkers of the lager beer brands, a sizable number of women, especially the educated ones are not left out in cooling off with some bottles on a regular basis.

While some religion bodies preach against consuming lager beer because of its alcoholic contents, many of the faithful of these religious organizations still find way to consume these brands.

BusinessHallmark visited some highbrow hotels such as Sheraton Hotels and Towers, Protea hotel, Airport hotel, Jabital International hotel, Point One and other local hotels to determine the different beer brands on their bars.

Apart from the lager beers, the local breweries also have other popular brands, which fetch these companies’ revenues on a daily basis, Origi brand, Maltina brand, Maltex, Amstelmalta, Guiness Malta, and a host of other non alcoholic brands are very popular with women, youths, children and religious faithful who preach against consumption of lager beer.

A chat with a barman of a popular night club at Ikeja, Lagos showed that most of the local brands are consumed by different categories of Nigerians, depending on their social statue, which parts of the country they are from, their pockets and other considerations.

The barman Mr. Sam Preye disclosed that while some of the brands enjoy national patronage, some other brands were more consumed by the indigenes of the particular state or the region where the brands are manufacture.

“Nigerians love to drink beer, male and female. Some of these brands are consumed across the country while some of the brands are just consume by the indigenes of the state where the brands are manufacture and maybe the people of the neighbouring states, close to where the brands are made.

“Also, some of the local breweries produce only for their state and few neighbouringstates, they don’t take the pain to send their products to far places. They appear to be contended with the sales within their locality.”

He cited some of the local breweries which appear to produce for just their locality to include Consolidated Brewery, Sona Brewery, Bendel Brewery, Plateau Brewery, Golden Guinea Brewery, Umuahia, Life Brewery, Onitsha, Anambra State and other smaller breweries across the country.

However the likes of Nigerian Breweries Plc has huge plants in Lagos, Ibadan, Aba, Ama Plant, Enugu and in other locations to enable its popular brands to be visible all over the country.

Guinness Nigeria Plc with its head office in Oba Akran area of Ikeja, has huge plants at Ogba, Lagos, Benin City, Edo state and some other locations to enable its brands easily get to Nigerians who like them.

BusinessHallmark findings showed that while the “Big boys” prefer Heneiken lager beer, the likes of Star lager, Gulder, Harp, 33, Trophy, Hero, and other brands have their consumers too.

Our findings showed that in South West geopolitical region, Star appears to be the most consumed, follow by Gulder, Harp, 33, and other brands.

In Lagos, the big boys go for the Heneiken brand,followed by Star, Gulder, Harp, 33 and the other local brands available.

In South South, our findings showed that Star,Gulder, Harp and other brands were the brands the people in that part of the country consume.

In the South East area, Hero appears to be the most popular brand, followed by the Star,Gulder, Harp and the other local brands in the geopolitical region.

In the North Central Star, Gulder, Harp, Legend and other local brands manufacture in Plateau state and other parts of the north are widely consume by the people in that parts of the country.

However, in the Stout brand category, Guinness Stout brand is the most consumed stout across the country based on our findings.

While the Guinness Nigeria Plc’sOrijinbrand produce out of the roots and leaves have become very popular among Nigerians male and female alike.