Japanese brewing force, Kirin Brewery Co., posted on November 11 its group sales and profits for the nine-month period through September grew on year as strength in soft drink and other operations made up for a slump in its mainline beer business, Dow Jones Newswires reported. Kirin said its group net profit grew 13% to Y34.87 billion from the Y30.86 billion it posted for the same period last year. Group sales edged up 0.1% to Y1.174 trillion from Y1.172 trillion. For the full business year ending December, Kirin kept intact the outlook it made in August. It continues to expect a group operating profit of Y90 billion, a net profit of Y33 billion and sales of Y1.610 trillion.

A wet and unusually cool summer in Japan this year cast a cloud over the beer industry in July and August. In addition, a May tax hike and consequent price rise for relatively low-priced low-malt beer products prompted some consumers to shift to other low-priced alcoholic beverages, such as "chuhai" fruit-flavored alcoholic beverages. As a result, industrywide beer shipments during the January-September period fell 7.5% in volume on year. A Kirin spokesman said the company's beer sales were mostly in line with the industrywide decline.

A sales breakdown showed sales at its liquor operations fell 3.6% on year to Y761.5 billion due to a slump in sales of regular and low-malt beer.

Kirin said parent sales fell 5.4% to Y700.12 billion. But strong sales at subsidiaries - Australasian beer and wine group Lion Nathan Ltd. and Kirin Beverage Corp. led to on-year growth in group sales albeit at a mild 0.1% pace. Efficient allocation of operating expenses at the parent company also led to on-year profit growth on a group basis, the company said. Group operating profit grew 5.2% on year to Y81.88 billion.

12 November, 2003