Almasi, the holding company for three Coca Cola bottling plants (Mt. Kenya Bottlers, Rift Valley Bottlers, Kisii Bottlers), had 2014 revenue Kshs 6.7 billion (up from 5.8 billion) and a pre-tax profit of Kshs 516 million (up from 256M). The company, which is 51% owned by Centum Investments, will pay out a dividend of 0.12 per shares (total Kshs 92 million) to shareholders.

The company has installed a new, and faster, glass bottling line and will launch a plastic bottling one at Nyeri in 2016, in line with trends in the beverage business where plastic, not glass bottles, are the preferred buy choice by consumers.

Almasi distributed about 29% of the Coca Cola products in Kenya, equally spread by the three plants and they see the governments plans for Northern and Eastern Kenya where improvements in infrastructure (around LAPSSET) and security over the next few years as an opportunity to open up new markets for their products.

The company also has a few tax claims from the Kenya Revenue Authority, but the directors don’t feel they will materialize.

$1 = Kshs 102