Urmatt Group set for nationwide launch of organic coconut water
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AFTER starting out in the rice business, Urmatt Group has expanded to other organic agricultural products including eggs, rice bran, chia seeds, pad Thai pasta and the latest offering, coconut water.
Urmatt chief executive officer Arvind Narula, who shifted his business empire to 100 per cent organic more than 20 years ago, is gearing up to make a nationwide debut of his “Maprao” organic coconut water around the end of this month.
“We’ve been doing this for almost two years, selling it only at the Villa Market [branches]. But from late this month, we will sell is all over the country. Our target is every supermarket,” Narula said in an interview with The Nation.
The Maprao team is being strengthened with David Spencer, a former business development director at General Electric in Hong Kong, and a Young Presidents’ Organisation (YPO) colleague of Narula, who is joining as the CEO and a shareholder of the operating company, Coco Nuts Ltd.
Retailing for at Bt49 per 250-millilitre bottle, Maprao is marketed as a premium product for middle-to-upper-income consumers. The brand is named after the Thai word for “coconut” to reflect its no-compromise taste.
Like other products of the group, Maprao is certified by Ecocert and the US Department of Agriculture as genuinely organic.
The target is to sell 50,000 bottles a day of Maprao within the next 12 months, and 200,000 a day within two years.
“We know the market size and we’re already discussed [talking] with all supermarkets and distributors,” Narula said.
At present the Thai coconut-water market is estimated to total nearly 1 million coconuts a day, half of which is sold in bottles, and the other half in pre-cut diamond-shaped coconuts.
The group has invested more than Bt70 million to set up a production facility in Ratchaburi, where it has established a network of contracted farmers to supply organic coconuts to the plant.
Though Maprao’s primary target consumers will be Thais, the group is also eyeing overseas markets, as coconut water is the fastest-growing drink worldwide.
Marketing director Niki Narula, Arvind’s son, said Maprao would look to join in lifestyle and youth-oriented events such as the next month’s “Ultra Singapore” electronic-music festival after it was selected as one of the event’s three sponsors.
Assisted by his son and a team of young executives representing multiple cultures, Arvind, 65, has pursued each of his new ventures through joint investments with some of his friends at the YPO.
Besides Maprao and Hilltribe Organics, which sells free-range, certified organic eggs, other organic ventures include Perfect Earth, which sells chia seeds, pasta and rice products, and Urmatt Life, which offers rice-bran supplements.
“Our approach is that in everything we produce, we look at making it the raw material for our next step, always. We maximise integration,” said the Urmatt CEO. Hence his planned new products include hard-boiled organic eggs (with green curry) and instant noodle made from organic chia seeds.
Arvind Narula became the first member of YPO Thailand to win the Global Impact award from the organisation last year.
His Hilltribe Organics recently also received a positive social impact assessment review by a team of Master of Business Administration students from HEC Paris, a European business school.
