Visakha Dairy set to enter Hyd

Visakha Co-operative Dairy is planning to enter the Hyderabad market within the next two months, to boost its milk product sales. The dairy expects the move to push its milk products' turnover beyond the Rs 50-crore mark from the current turnover of Rs 42.5 crore.

"At present, we are marketing our milk products in the four coastal districts "� Visakhapatnam, Srikakulam, Vijaynagaram and East Godavari. We are planning to appoint one C&F agent at Hyderabad to market our products in and around the state capital, within one or two months," N V Venkata Rao, managing director, Visakha Co-operative Dairy, told Business Standard.

"In the first phase, we will set up a minimum of 200 outlets to market our milk products in and around Hyderabad. We are expecting daily sales of around Rs 2,000 from each outlet," Rao said.

"Visakha Dairy is already marketing 25,000 litres of milk per day in the state capital. We are, therefore, confident of marketing our milk products in a large scale in the city," he added.

Visakha Dairy has been marketing several milk products like buttermilk, flavoured milk, ghee, butter, milk cake, curd, milk cova and others.

During the fiscal ended March 2004, the dairy's turnover of milk products touched Rs 42.5 crore as compared with Rs 31 crore in the previous year, thus registering a 37 per cent growth.

"In the current fiscal, we expect our turnover to be around Rs 210 crore, with Rs 50 crore coming in from milk product sales," he said.

"Visakha Dairy is planning to set up one ice cream manufacturing unit at Visakhapatnam. Once this unit is ready, our milk products' turnover will increase further," he added.

The dairy at present has 425 milk parlours and 1,800 outlets in the four districts, with plans to add another 125 milk parlours and 700 outlets in the current fiscal.