Inmarko sells more ice cream in cold Siberia than its competitors in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Chairman of the Board of Directors of the company Dmitry Dokin is sure that in order to achieve success, you just need to talk more.
When Dmitry Dokin tries to explain something, he can't help but laugh. It can be seen that life seems to him inexplicable and very funny. It is no coincidence that he often uses the word "for some reason."
For some reason, it is believed that in Siberia people often drink vodka to keep warm from the cold. But the Inmarko company, for some reason, sells as much ice cream in Siberia as others cannot sell in Moscow and St. Petersburg.
It is not the first year that Inmarko has been the leader of the Russian market, but today it is surrounded from all sides. In Moscow, Ice-Fili merged with Ramsay, St. Petersburg's Talosto bought the Metelitsa near Moscow and is eyeing the Novosibirsk Gulliver, whose owner lives in the same house with the three owners of Inmarko. “Through the wall we are knocking with him,” Dokin jokes.
And even the most sworn rival Andrey Sitnikov from another leading company in Siberia - "Russian Cold" - put under the windows of the house where Dokin lives, his branded ice cream kiosk. I set it out of spite: the traffic of buyers here is small, but the traffic of top managers of Inmarko is high.
But Dmitry Dokin is not embarrassed by all this. He believes that five or six national producers will remain on the market in three years. “And with a great deal of confidence, for some reason, we believe that we will be the first,” Dokin laughs.
MARKET
According to the Union of Ice Cream Workers of Russia, last year the production of ice cream decreased by 2.5% and amounted to 377.5 thousand tons. This year is also expected to decrease. True, according to Business Analytics, in value terms, the market grew by 10% in 2004: manufacturers produce fewer cheap traditional cups and more expensive ice cream. The largest players are the Siberian companies Inmarko and Russian Cold, St. and international Nestle.
The latest market events are associated with the purchase of assets: in the fall, the investment company Fleming Family & Partner's acquired the Moscow factory Ice-Fili and entered into an alliance with the Ramsay company, which owns a network of 800 kiosks in Moscow, and Talosto bought the Metelitsa factory near Moscow . Analysts believe that all this is just the beginning of a long-awaited market consolidation. The top five still account for only 30% of the market.
Farmer in Denmark Bjarne Bogner Dima's tree grows. It is named after Dmitry Dokin, because it was grown from the seed of a tree on which that "organism was damaged." The head of Inmarko climbed on it to shake off the bumps, slipped into a ravine of a mountain river - that's what hurt it.
Knocking down bumps - that was Dokin's business. The fact is that Denmark holds 80% of the European Christmas tree market, and buys 95% of the seeds for its Christmas trees in Georgia. Small and crooked freaks grow on the mountain slopes, which can hardly be called spruces. But for some reason, the most competitive Christmas trees grow from their seeds in the Danish climate.
Dmitry Dokin met Danish farmers in the late 1980s, when they came to the institute where Dokin worked as a researcher in search of ways to reduce the cost of production. He had nothing to do with reducing the cost of production: he was engaged in cultivators and seeders. But for some reason, it was he who was called to communicate with the guests. Probably because there were few young people in science, and communication had to be established with foreigners who were not yet old at all. In addition, the Danes wanted to go to Irkutsk, where, as it happened, Dmitry had friends.
While driving, one Dane complained that he used to buy seeds centrally, through Moscow, and now that the Soviet Union collapsed, the purchase process was much more complicated. So for Dokin, scientific work ended and business began. Moreover, Dmitry also had friends in Georgia. And he knew how to climb trees from childhood.
“We have cedars growing here. We can climb. My father taught me,” explains Dokin.
- Is the ability to climb a tree included in the Siberian gentleman's set? - I don’t understand. - Why climb cedars?
Why pick mushrooms? Pine nuts are useful. And this is the drive. We don't have mountains.
Dmitry Dokin loves the drive. And, accordingly, likes to drive a car. He does not understand businessmen who are carried in the back seat: you sit there, "like a freak."
We are racing along the road leading to Krasnoobsk, a town 20 minutes from Novosibirsk. Dmitry driving a Mercedes SUV. But this is not his car, but his wife's: he recently “damaged” his Toyota Land Cruiser once again.
“It’s not always possible to turn in on time,” Dokin explains, turning the steering wheel at full speed with one palm and abruptly parks between two cars.
Krasnoobsk is still not a village, but an urban-type settlement with 18,000 inhabitants. And not just a village, but an academic town. On the right side of the "appendix" - 11 agricultural institutes, on the left - high-rise buildings where the institutes live.
This campus has become an incubator for small businesses. When Dmitry Dokin was collecting cones, his childhood friend, with whom he went to the same kindergarten, Andrey Odinets together with Vadim Lyubimtsev and other countrymen created the "Investment and marketing company" - "Inmarko". According to the legend, Vadim Lyubimtsev wanted to buy ice cream from his grandmother, stood in line, but did not buy it, it ended. And so the business idea was born: to deliver ice cream to grandmothers so that it would not end.
Dokin then developed his own business - he had already switched to trading in animal feed and importing Ferrero and Hershey's chocolate. But the ice cream workers needed his communications, so at first Dokin, in his own words, simply helped, and then he joined the share.
Although Dokin no longer dealt with Christmas trees, he was friends with the Dane. It suddenly turned out that a friend who grew Dima's tree at home is very useful for business. For some reason, it so happened that his son went to the same kindergarten with the grandson of the director of the Danish factory Unilever-Frisko. This turned out to be very opportunely: the Inmarko company was just looking for suppliers in Europe.
“The Danes didn’t believe us: some devils from Siberia have appeared, they want to buy ice cream,” Dokin laughs. And they heard that in Siberia in winter it is minus 35 degrees. So we thought that under the guise of ice cream we would bring something else - weapons or drugs. But my friend stood up, said that he was with us, for some reason he did not see any weapons or drugs. Barely got them knocked down. In August 1994, we sold eight trucks of ice cream. In 2003, Unilever entered the market and sold less than eight trucks. In a year.
funny peopleI grew up in a world where Europe is called the West. In Novosibirsk, they call the place where I live, European Russia, the West. At first, I didn’t understand expressions like: “For some reason, in the West they love ice cream in the form of bars.” He was not even offended when Dokin said that "amusing people live in the West." These people are going to build a city for millionaires near Moscow, but they have ice cream, as the shareholder and marketing director puts it. Pavel Shutov,"full seams". From picking up a "seam" in a heap, its effectiveness does not increase. Therefore, the company is not afraid of buying up assets, started by competitors "in the West." “They have a strategy of buying up a small one, and we have a strategy of amalgamating a large one,” Shutov explains.
So, capital companies prefer to invest in advertising of hit brands, and distribution, according to Shutov, is not controlled. That is why ice cream in Moscow is of poor quality - after all, if the temperature in the freezer rises above minus 18 degrees, snowiness appears. And the man will not buy ice cream anymore.
Nestle in Russia, according to experts, advertising budget about $4 million, and Dmitry Dokin quotes from a study by the same company, which found that three-quarters of the advertising effect is spent on category promotion and only a quarter on the brand itself. Because the consumer will not look for a horn of a certain brand in different stores, but will buy the horn that is in the freezer.
Therefore, Inmarko invests the main money in placing its freezers in stores. The company has 26 thousand of them, only Nestle has more. AT next year it is planned to overtake Nestle: to deliver 15 thousand, and 2.7 thousand of them - in Moscow. In Novosibirsk, there is nowhere to put it, except perhaps in bakeries and hairdressers.
Inmarko freezers differ from the standard 18 options, including a remote thermometer to make it convenient to check the temperature, and a hidden computer chip - a kind of "anti-theft" tool. Dokin explains the “freezing policy” as follows: “Here in St. Petersburg, cold storage plant No. 1 doesn’t even have its own cars. They say there: “Why? They come for our ice cream themselves!” But the day will come when no one will come. It will come as a surprise to them. And what will they do next?
In order to fully fill its freezers and kiosks, Inmarko keeps a range of more than 100 items, with the main efforts being directed to three main brands: San Cremo, Tycoon and Lyubimy. The company is constantly probing the market, releasing 10-15 new products a year. There is a non-melting gummies ice cream. There is a tricolor horn. There is KVN ice cream, on which an inkjet caramel printer prints the jokes of the Club of the Cheerful and Resourceful.
You can't say that Inmarko is not advertised at all. But he does it very sparingly. After all, you can sell a lot of ice cream in 30 cities or a little in 100 - the turnover will be the same. "Russian cold" prefers a lot, but little, "Inmarko" - a little, but a lot. The concentration allows you to effectively invest in promotion and advertise your products only in those regions where Inmarko has a good market share.
In order to have a good market share, the company opens only large branches in those cities where it is possible to occupy more than 25% of the local market. Now there are only seven branches in the ZSI (zone of strategic interests) - from Perm to Chita.
In "Inmarko" their success in the market is explained by a "set of pluses". “You can put one plus sign, or you can put several,” says Dokin. "Inmarko" prefers to put all the pluses. And you never know which one is decisive.
- We talked with Nestle managers here, we ask: “Compare your freezer and ours - which one will people go to?” Even they agree that it’s ours,” says the head of Inmarko. “They have a classic design, everything is decorous and noble, like in a cemetery. The world is changing, but they do not have time to change, because they need to collect 25 signatures. Someone likes the old image: it is "in a good way conservative." And we are partisans, we can afford a lot.
- What kind of partisans are you, you have the first place.
- It's like looking. In Europe, we are only seventh.
The partisan unpretentiousness and practicality of Inmarko's managers have already become a legend on the market. The company rents an office 50 meters from the building where Dokin's father has been working for more than 40 years - at the Institute of Animal Feed. On the watch there they sell albums about the Zhiguli and a remedy for cockroaches Tarol by a certain Volkov. In the corridor there is a poster about the technology of growing fodder crops. The motto on the poster is: "The Feed Research Institute is your reliable partner." At the elevator on the wall, the motto is different: "Sasha is a sucker." Dokin presses the button for a long time, but without waiting, he gets up on foot.
Top managers of Inmarko walk around in sweaters and jeans, live in apartments they got under socialism, fly economy class, “because they are young, what difference does it make: sleep on the floor or on the bed.”
Dmitry Dokin is 42 years old, he likes to quote Boris Grebenshchikov and even sings along with Sasha Vasiliev when “Spleen” starts playing in the bar. And he is the most senior top manager at Inmarko, where the average age of directors is 31. Perhaps that is why directors prefer to communicate with each other in the company via ICQ. The owners of Inmarko themselves explain their austerity by the fact that money needs to be invested in the business - then it will develop. But it's hard to get rid of the feeling that they're just more comfortable that way.
Gather on the mountainIn the meeting room, on a large sheet of paper, it is written in blue felt-tip pen: “ Good morning". The President of Inmarko is negotiating with a supplier of freezers. Mobile Dokin cannot sit still - he changes his position all the time: either he leans back, crossing his arms, then he leans on the table, then he balances on the back legs of the chair. For some reason it seems to me that the chair will tip over, and Dokin will fly somersault.
“We can't understand how Italfrost freezers feel.
“Let me ask my people,” the partner suggests. “They now take 20-30 pieces a month. I'm meeting with them tomorrow.
“They delivered to Nestle distributors, but Nestle distributors don't talk to us.
“They will talk to me,” the partner promises.
Nestle distributors who don't talk to Dmitry Dokin are an exception to the rule. Most people in the market are willing to talk to the head of Inmarko. If you can’t find out about freezers from suppliers, you can ask competitors. I was at Inmarko when Talosto just bought Metelitsa. Dmitry immediately began to call one of the managers of the St. Petersburg company.
- Michael, hello. They say you bought Metelitsa? You missed something. You'll be with us soon, right? Listen, Michael, another question: did you buy Italfrost freezers this year - how do they behave?
According to Dokin, business is just good communications that greatly facilitate problem solving. Inmarko, for example, did not trade in neighboring Kuzbass for a long time: there was an unspoken decree of the local administration not to let strangers in. Dokin agreed to meet with the director of the largest Kuzbass manufacturer Snezhny Gorodok Sergei Bachurin on a day off at the ski resort of Kuzbass.
- We met and talked. I say: “Well, Sergey Mikhailovich, why are you sitting there alone, it’s somehow uncomfortable.” After that, we started trading in Kuzbass, and they are with us. If they had not had any relationship, they would not have been able to gather on the mountain.
Dokin's communications extend far beyond the Russian ice cream market. When you listen to him, you have to force yourself to believe. Because it's hard to believe. He tells how foreign friends helped to buy good equipment at a low price, how the managers of one European company set up the equipment during their holidays, how the managers of another come every year and suggest what is wrong and what needs to be improved.
Dokin "has relations" with almost all the leading ice cream producers in Europe. For example, with the Norwegian company Diplom Is - the only one in developed countries that did not let Unilever into its market. For two years the giant tried to gain a foothold, and then left. In the honorary gallery of certificates and medals of this company, the main place is given to a newspaper clipping dedicated to the departure of Unilever.
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In 2004, Inmarko's turnover was $64 million, and $100 million is expected in 2005. And this is probably the largest small business in Russia.
No, of course, everything in the company is organized seriously. In 2000, an American consultant from Rayter introduced strategic planning. Now being implemented process management and a balanced scorecard. The shareholders include the EBRD, and the company is preparing for an IPO.
- We even have procedures for each employee, - says Dokin. - Do you want me to show you the provisions governing my work?
He rummages through the laptop. There are many files in the procedure folder. Dokin never finds his own procedures, but he does find strategic competencies, according to which people are selected for the company.
“The main thing we want to see in people is the ability to work in a team, focus on quality, leadership, readiness for change,” Dokin lists. The list obviously seems incomplete to him, and he adds: - Willingness to die for the motherland.
Inmarko, like any modern company, has its own mission. It has even been printed and framed. Should hang and inspire. But they forgot to hang it, and it stands in Dokin's office, leaning against the wall.
And it’s not at all about the fact that the procedures and instructions at Inmarko are creatively interpreted, supplemented right on the go, or not executed at all. It's just that any bureaucracy in the company loses its power. It is impossible to understand, let alone explain, how this happens. Despite the size of the business and process management, everyone in Inmarko can do what is closer and more interesting to him.
CFO Natalya Yakhnova implements a balanced scorecard, production director Sergey Ivannikov- non-material motivation, the founder of the company Vadim Lyubimtsev - the opening of new branches, and Dmitry Dokin, who came into business later than others, general management.
The main strength - and according to competitors, the main weakness of Inmarko - is democracy. The philosophy of communications also operates within the company: here every decision is discussed with those who will implement it. The authoritarian Sitnikov from Russian Cold makes decisions on his own and, of course, faster. But Inmarko believes that speed is not the main thing.
- Of course, any meeting slows down the speed of decision-making, - Dokin agrees. - You can, of course, take it right away. And you can get back a little consult and accept. We think the second way is better. In my opinion, this is how the whole world lives, and only in our country people need to be taught to communicate. We don’t speak Russian well: as a rule, for some reason, they start swearing. Probably, 72 years of Soviet power did not pass without a trace. But you have to learn to talk with everyone - with princes, and with Cinderellas, and with barmaley, because you have to live with everyone. If you don't learn, how will you exist?
It is very difficult for Inmarko managers to exist today. The company, which previously explored Siberia, has now entered into a difficult battle for the European regions, and it is also torn apart by internal contradictions. Business is growing, new people are pouring in, production is already divided between Novosibirsk and Omsk, and it is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain the unique culture of the company, which is its main competitive advantage. Natalya Yakhnova joined the team later than others and can judge problems more detachedly. “Now I'm trying to convince management that we need a secretary, at least one for all directors,” she says.
His children eatDokin does not like gold, so he does not keep a single piece of gold at home and does not enter Orthodox churches. He calls himself a pagan. In a sense, he can also be called a fetishist. Every time he is in St. Petersburg, he stops by the Catherine Palace to touch the yellow stone in the Amber Room to the indignant cries of the caretakers.
He also has a special relationship with ice cream. When Dmitry was a schoolboy, grandparents lived in Moscow, and he came to visit them, and they took him to GUM. He ate ice cream there and dreamed of eating only waffles, because they seemed very tasty to him. Now, getting into the waffle shop, Dokin always performs a ritual: he always eats some waffles.
“There is a strong emotional component in this business,” Dokin admits. “You can work in a factory that produces vinegar and make the highest quality or cheapest vinegar. But morally, it will not give you anything. And we make a pleasant product, its children eat it.
In the Inmarko office there is a whole gallery of paintings with rewritten scenes by famous painters. Everything is reimagined in terms of ice cream: a girl on an ice cream bowl, a dance around the ice cream, an Indian woman with an ice cream cake. They even managed to fit Eskimo into Malevich's black square.
Maxim Kotin
How Deputy Terentyev manages to run a business and manage offshore companies without having declared assets and living in a Moscow apartment on the terms of gratuitous use
By the post-Easter Monday, the deadline for the publication by State Duma deputies and officials of property and income declarations had ended. According to Nikolai Kovalev, chairman of the commission for monitoring the reliability of information about deputy incomes, the innovation of the declarations for 2013 was the absence of foreign assets among all the elected representatives. Of course, Nikolai Dmitrievich made such a statement, taking the deputy reports on faith. But it is understood that information about assets and income has yet to be verified. Any discrepancies between these declarations and real facts are fraught with the most stringent organizational conclusions, up to depriving dishonest parliamentarians of deputy mandates. This is well understood by the elected officials themselves, having learned from the bitter experience of some of their colleagues who left the State Duma last year. However, the eyes are afraid, but the hands do. Take the deputy from A Just Russia Alexander Vasilievich Terentyev, who in 2013 was already called to the commission on ethics on suspicion of owning foreign offshore companies. The relevant foreign information resources clearly stated that, for example, an offshore company Targis Universal, Corp (established in 2004), as well as a number of other similar structures, was registered in the name of Alexander Terentyev. A vote was even launched on the kontrev.livejournal resource about what Terentyev would choose - the preservation of the deputy mandate or the ownership of offshore companies? At the same time, it was discovered that several more offshore companies belong to Terentyev’s wife, Olga Anatolyevna. It would seem that the parliamentarian was caught red-handed. But Terentyev managed to get out of the water dry, assuring his colleagues that it was not about him, but about his full namesake. Terentiev offered the same version on the issue of his wife. For some reason, the members of the ethics commission did not check the words of the parliamentarian. And in vain, because, for example, it soon became clear that Terentyev A.V. For a long time there have been assets in the then Ukrainian Crimea. Since March of this year, the Crimean assets of the parliamentarian have already been Russian territory. But did the deputy forget to include them in the declaration for 2013 as foreign property?
Judging by the declared declaration for the last year, deputy Terentyev earned 5.827 million rubles during the reporting period, and his wife earned 29.411 million rubles. The main sources of income for the commercially successful wife of the parliamentarian were interest from bank deposits, the sale of a stake in Golf-Vizhi LLC, as well as the gesheft from loans to legal and individuals(in total, the list of its borrowers includes 51 structures and surnames). As in last year's declaration, in a fresh document, Terentyev indicates that his wife owns three houses in the Russian Federation. But there was only one plot of land left with an area of 1200 square meters. m - while in previous declarations there was also a land plot of 8 hectares (at the same time, nothing was said about its sale or transfer to a third party in the declaration for 2013). Unlike the other half, deputy Terentiev himself, judging by his declaration, does not have any real estate at all, but lives in a Moscow apartment in Karamyshevsky passage with an area of 337 square meters. m, provided to him and his family on the terms of gratuitous use. In 2013, deputy Terentiev, like his wife, provided himself with an increase in the modest Duma salary with interest from bank deposits and commercial loans to legal entities and individuals. In general, the spouses rose quite well as entrepreneurs-interest-bearers. It is clear that the minor son of the Terentievs Platon, born in 1999, indicated in the declaration. had no income, no interest, no shares in property during the reporting period. But the deputy Terentyev did not indicate the eldest son Anton in the declaration. The parliamentarian did not formally violate the law here, since according to the legislative requirements, adult children are not responsible for their father. However, in fact, it is known that Anton Terentyev heads several companies at once, which actually belong to his father.
In addition, in the latest declaration of Terentiev A.V. again nothing is said about foreign assets. And, meanwhile, on the Offshorelix website, Alexander Vasilyevich is still listed as the owner of offshore companies. The parliamentarian didn't even bother to cover his tracks! Not a word is said in the declaration about the house in the Crimea. It is clear that the lawyers advised the deputy to stand on the absence of these assets. After all, if Terentyev had indicated in his declaration for 2013 that he had gotten rid of foreign offshore companies, the question would inevitably arise as to why the deputy denied their existence at all a year earlier. The same applies to the declaration of the MP's wife. But if foreign assets can be more or less hidden away, then with the Crimean, and even controversial assets, the problems are just beginning. The deputy is unlikely to want to isolate himself completely from these assets on the peninsula. And even if he begins to deny, then sooner or later Terentiev's property rights to Crimean assets will still emerge. Their hasty sale (donation) to a figurehead is also not an option: given the Russian status of Crimea, such a deal will quickly be highlighted and become the property of the media. In general, no matter how you turn it, the annexation of Crimea to the Russian Federation greatly complicated the life of State Duma deputy A.V. Terentiev.
It seems that all that the deputy could oppose to the danger that arose was to achieve the appointment of himself, his beloved, as chairman of the council being created in Crimea regional office Party "Fair Russia". Probably, according to the plan of the chosen one, such a party position to some extent should help him block the possible consequences of the problem with the Crimean real estate. What and how much such a party appointment to the Crimea cost Alexander Terentyev, one can only guess. But the costs were not long in coming: since the same Terentiev simultaneously heads the Altai branch of the "SR", the inhabitants of the region reasonably wondered how this parliamentarian is going to sit on two chairs at once? Such double-dealing has never happened before in party practice. Alexander Terentyev himself is trying to reassure the public with a promise to deal with both the Crimean and Altai fronts. However, the electorate has every reason not to believe Terentiev, who was known as a lack of initiative, sluggish, and even thieving deputy. Thus, it is estimated that during his work in the State Duma of the current convocation, Alexander Terentyev spoke at plenary sessions only two (!) times. Yes, and what is called, "on the dancers", that is, from the spot. According to the profile of his Duma committee on construction and land relations, Terentiev has never once pleased voters and colleagues with a single initiative. Terentiev also did not propose a single bill. True, his name can be found among the inscribed co-authors of a number of non-core legislative initiatives rejected by the State Duma. However, it has long been no secret that Duma slackers like Terentyev use such a trick to imitate at least some deputy activity. In addition, Terentiev rarely appears within the walls of the lower chamber.
The question is: why should A Just Russia appoint such a “gray” chosen one to such a responsible area of political work as Crimea? The answer to this difficult question lies in the biography of Alexander Terentiev. In the Just Russia party and the State Duma, Terentyev is known as a co-owner of the Russian Cold holding, one of the main producers and sellers of ice cream in the Russian Federation. Alexander Terentiev himself, in a narrow circle, has repeatedly boasted that he is perhaps the most generous sponsor of the party and its leader, Sergei Mironov. In exchange for gifts, according to the deputy, he was promised immunity and almost an indulgence for any fraud. The appointment of Terentyev as the head of the Altai branch of A Just Russia also smacked of intra-party corruption at one time. It would seem that this is logical: the head office of Russian Cold is located exactly in Barnaul. But in the capital of the Altai Territory, deputy Alexander Terentyev is considered not a businessman, but just "the chairman of the Pound." The Altaians have a corresponding attitude towards Terentyev's deputy activity. Thus, it is well known in business circles that the main shareholder of Russian Cold is the president of the holding, Andrey Sitnikov. State Duma deputy Alexander Terentyev is a nominal figure appointed to represent the interests of certain individuals who took him on as a political backing dancer.
“Shura Terentiev is an empty place, a trash under the fence, which is dressed up in a deputy’s suit. For this costume, he grew tresses to look like a young hipster, ”one of his longtime acquaintances says about the parliamentarian, laughing. According to him, in the companies where Terentyev was appointed as chairman by Pound, he is only trying to play the role of a solid businessman who makes decisions. In fact, Deputy Terentyev is a soap bubble.
Alexander Terentyev always knew how to lie and dodge, which his current owners appreciated, deciding to use it as a disposable product. From this point of view, the details of the biography of the chosen one Alexander Terentyev are very curious. Judging by the documents, the future deputy-Socialist-Revolutionary once graduated from a vocational school, an oil technical school in northern Noyabrsk and a certain Tauride University in Simferopol. What the oilman Terentyev was drawn from the north to study in the Crimea is not known for certain. The fact of his any long stay within the walls of the Simferopol university has not been established. But it's no secret to anyone in Crimea that in the early 1990s in Tavrichesky it was possible to buy a diploma even by mail - that is, by sending money and receiving crusts in a package in return.
The deputy Alexander Terentiev could never say anything definite about the origin of his capital. Meanwhile, at the end of the 80s, the future deputy and nominal ice cream man Terentyev became an assistant to the then deputy general director of Noyabrskneftegaz, Alexander Kulakovsky, who later, together with businessman Mikhail Khimich, created the NaftaSib company, a large oil trader in those days, controlling, in particular, , sales of "Sidanco" from the Angarsk petrochemical plant. NaftaSib was a co-owner of the Moscow bank UNICOR, controlled the Tula salt company.
Alexander Terentiev worked in all structures associated with NaftaSib and his patron Kulakovsky, but the positions of the future chosen one did not differ in height. Terentiev managed to grow only to the post of assistant to the head of NaftaSib, that is, the same Alexander Kulakovsky. But in 2000, Alexander Terentyev unexpectedly headed the board of directors of the Moscow construction company“P.F.K. – Dom”, which was created and controlled by Kulakovsky. Now this company de facto does not exist. A few years later, Alexander Terentyev joined the Russian Cold corporation: but not as the main shareholder, as the deputy himself likes to say, but only in the role of chairman.
According to informed sources, in fact, Russian Cold belongs to Alexander Kulakovsky, who, for a number of reasons, is now forced to live abroad. Therefore, the role of the ice-cream deputy Terentyev as one of the main sponsors of the Just Russia party is very conditional and formal.
However, Terentiev does not live in poverty, and his income statement does not at all reflect the true welfare of the Altai Pound. Those who know Terentyev closely are aware that this right-wing Russian has issued a number of assets for his wife Olga, for which a huge tax debt has arisen and continues to grow like a snowball. Few even of the most frostbitten scammers dare to set up their family members so clearly and subtly. But Alexander Terentyev, it seems, does not care about his wife: apparently, she is for him - consumable who are not sorry, in which case, and hide behind. Deputy Terentyev does exactly the same with his own eldest son Anton, whom the chosen one-adventurer literally shoves as the formal head of his murky companies, not at all thinking about how this will affect the future of the offspring.
A separate story is the disputed assets of Terentyev in the Crimea. When tensions escalated on the peninsula at the end of winter, the ice-cream deputy was eager to join the parliamentary group that visited Sevastopol and Simferopol on the last day of February. Under the guise of an official visit, Terentiev hoped to negotiate with the military about the protection of his assets. But at the last minute, Terentyev had to abandon this plan: the assets were not declared, and in the event of actions to save them, other deputies from the Russian delegation could find out about them. Now, by hook or by crook, having acquired the powers of a senior Crimean Socialist-Revolutionary, the deputy hopes not only to legalize his local assets, but also quietly increase them with land, which will be divided according to the new cadastral plan. In addition, businessmen with a dubious reputation remained among Terentyev’s friends on the peninsula, who once “blinded” him a diploma from Taurida University. In general, deputy Terentyev's selfish interest in Crimea is understandable.
Funt-Terentiev has many such "skeletons in the closet". It is no wonder that the deputy, who is afraid of revelations and, in general, of any attention to his person, earlier refused to participate in the election of the governor of the Altai Territory, which will be held in September this year. At a press conference in Barnaul, Terentiev complained about the high cost of the election campaign. Like, where does the poor deputy get such money from? In fact, Alexander Terentyev is well aware that he and the deputies of the State Duma have only a few months left to sit. In the future, a loud scandal is already clearly looming for him, exposing his frauds and deceptions and, as a result, a criminal case with a camera. After all, Pound-Terentiev immediately violated a number of laws and articles of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. Firstly, his shadow activities are quite drawn to fraud and tax evasion on an especially large scale. Secondly, participation in business is incompatible with the status of a State Duma deputy. Thirdly, concealment of information about property, including foreign assets, is guaranteed to be a red card for departure from parliament. Fourthly, Terentiev also risks being prosecuted for forging documents, bribing voters and attempting to bribe officials. By the way, having got used to the role of the “purse” of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, invented by him, Alexander Terentyev did not notice how he turned into an ordinary corrupt official. It is unlikely that A Just Russia, or Russia in general, needs such a client. Especially as chairman of the party branch in the Crimea, which should become a showcase for Russian parliamentarism, and not a place of sludge for dark personalities.
Sitnikov Andrey Anatolyevich - President of the company "Russian Cold"
Journalist: What goals did the management set for itself when creating your company?
Sitnikov Andrey Anatolyevich: Our main goal was to create a new company that would produce Russian goods and trade with America, Europe and around the world. In 1999, after analyzing the market situation, it was decided to establish a company for the production and sale of ice cream. To implement this positioning strategy, the company implemented major projects to build a new Moscow factory and improve the efficiency of all production processes at the Altai factory. This allowed us, the only one in Russia, to obtain a permit for the supply of ice cream to Europe (Euro number No. 1, issued by the certification commission of the European Union in August 2005) and a license to supply ice cream to the USA (the license was issued by the certification commission of the Ministry of Agriculture United States in May 2006).
Our main competitive advantage has been the combination of the possibilities of new technologies obtained from the world's leading manufacturers of specialized equipment and high-quality, natural ingredients, many of which are collected in the unique Altai region (honey, sea buckthorn, pine nuts, blueberries and others).
From the idea of using traditional, natural, Russian raw materials in the production of ice cream, the name of the company was born - "Russian Cold". At the very beginning of the work, the management of the Russky Kholod company chose the strategy of producing ice cream with excellent taste, healthy properties and original, and sometimes unique forms. In the production of our ice cream, we focus not only on Russian consumers, but also take into account the needs of our former compatriots in many countries of the world. This is a very important area of activity for us, since the total number of our former compatriots in the US and EU countries is more than 30 million people. A confirmation of the existence of a stable demand for high-quality Russian ice cream is the dynamic growth of our sales to the EU countries and the USA. Among our loyal consumers there is an increasing number of consumers - the natives of Europe and the United States, who have appreciated the optimal combination of the high international level of quality of our ice cream and a reasonable price.
Journalist: Why, in your opinion, other companies in the industry did not set themselves the goal of developing sales abroad?
Sitnikov A.A.: Other enterprises include production facilities created on the basis of old Soviet cold storage plants. And their main goal is to squeeze the maximum profit out of these assets with minimal costs in a short time. We are thinking about the future and we know that our Western partners have a completely different attitude towards our production, created in full compliance with European and American standards, than towards the old enterprises of competitors, which will be fully depreciated in the near future.
Journalist: Your main competitors are skeptical about your achievements and plans to develop ice cream exports to Europe and the USA. For example, the chairman of the board of directors of the Inmarko company assures that they sell as much ice cream in just one quarter of Novosibirsk as Russian Cold sells abroad. What do you think about it?
Sitnikov A.A.: Firstly, Dmitry Dokin has absolutely no information about the volume of our export deliveries. According to our data, we export much more ice cream than Dmitry Dokin imagines, but this is not the main thing. A possible reason for such comments from our competitors is the desire to disguise their inability, financially and technologically, to build a production similar to ours. Which would also meet very strict European and American standards of quality, hygienic safety and efficiency. We assume that in order to bring them production assets in line with European and American standards, they will need to restructure production to a large extent. And the ice cream mixture preparation system, pipelines, valves will have to be completely replaced.
Such major changes cost more than one million dollars. But this is not the main thing. The most important thing is that for such a reconstruction, the enterprises of our competitor must be stopped for 6-7 months. That is why it is more convenient for Dmitry Dokin to act according to the principle: if you cannot do something, then you need to explain that you do not need it.
Journalist: The construction of such a modern and powerful production facility required a very large investment from you. Why did you choose this development path?
Sitnikov A.A.: Yes, of course, the construction of such a factory is very expensive. At the moment, after the commissioning of the second stage of the factory and the second stage of the refrigerating warehouse, the volume of investments has already amounted to more than 50 million dollars. The enterprise was built in an open field and in full compliance with the advanced world standards. We made the decision to build our own new factory after we realized that it is impossible to buy a single enterprise in the industry that would meet necessary requirements. All enterprises in the industry are obsolete.
It was not possible to modernize these factories. We consider the investment in the new Moscow factory very promising and important for the development of our company. New opportunities are opening up for the company to enter new, profitable markets in Europe and the United States. In addition, we are confidently making plans to strengthen the company's position after joining the WTO. Compliance with international standards increases our ability to successfully compete with Western ice cream producers, which will be more active in our market after Russia joins the WTO.
An important component of our successful development is the fact that we actually produce only high-tech and highly profitable types of ice cream. And we produce very little wafer cup, no more than 10%. Our main competitors do not make money on these low-tech types, but only try to improve their performance by purposefully increasing the gross sales of low-income ice cream (waffle cup, waffle briquette, etc.).
Journalist: How do you assess the prospects for the development of the Russian Food Industry and your industry in particular?
Sitnikov A.A.: We believe that in the future Russia will become a powerful industrial state, one of the five world leaders. And we want to make a contribution to the formation of Russia as a full participant in the world market for ice cream and dairy products. So far, Russky Kholod is the only company on the ice cream market that fully complies with these ambitious Russian plans.
We will continue to strengthen our leading position in export deliveries of Russian ice cream to Western markets.
Profile - company history
Siberia is the birthplace of three major federal players in the Russian market ice cream: Inmarko (10.8% of the market), Russian Cold (6.3%) and Snezhny Gorodok (3%). One of the most dynamic and at the same time closed companies is the Russky Kholod concern. “Many experts are more or less aware of the ice cream market, but practically no one knows specifically about the Russkiy Kholod corporation,” said Dmitry Dokin, chairman of the board of directors of Inmarko OJSC. The corporation does not publish its financial statements and is extremely reluctant to comment on its actions. Observers note that the success of Russian Cold is the result of the management strategy of one person - the shareholder and president of the company, Andrei Sitnikov.
Together closely
In the "Russian Cold" itself, they talk very vaguely about the birth of the "cold giant". “Friends, Siberian entrepreneurs, owners of a wholesale company selling confectionery in Siberia and Europe, decided to found new company, which would produce Russian goods and trade with Asia, Europe and around the world. In 1999, after analyzing the market situation, it was decided to establish a company in Barnaul for the production and sale of ice cream, ”the press service of Russkiy Kholod told SU sparingly. In fact, these Siberian entrepreneurs were the Moscow dealer of Stollwerk (Alpen Gold) and the seller own brand Mainford (produced at the German factory Weinrish) Andrey Sitnikov and the Moscow dealer of Stollwerk and Mauxion Konstantin Romanenko. Later, they were joined by Alexander Terentiev (now the president of Altaikholod), who is related to the oil business. It is his market participants that today consider the main shareholder of "Russian Cold". Altaiholod, the largest ice cream manufacturer in Altai, was chosen as the company's production site.
Even earlier, in the summer of 1998, shareholders of another Siberian player in the ice cream market, Inmarko, became interested in Altaiholod. This Novosibirsk company by that time had just completed the purchase of the Omsk cold storage plant. “By May 1998, we already had control over the enterprise in Omsk, and at that time we learned that Altaiholod was being sold. We decided to buy. But since large financial resources were invested in the purchase of the Omsk Khladokombinat, without a partner-co-investor, we would not have pulled this deal, ”recalls Dmitry Dokin. Among others, Inmarko's proposal was responded to by the company's long-term partner, the Moscow chocolate distributor Senat (the main brand is Mainford), represented by its director Andrei Sitnikov, a native of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, and his business colleague Konstantin Romanenko. Having studied the state of Altaiholod, they agreed to act as co-investors with Inmarko.
Production funds of the Barnaul enterprise (at that time the capacity was 600 tons of products per month) were worn out to the same extent as at most other large Siberian cold storage plants. The only noticeable difference, according to Mr. Dokin, was the European-style renovation made in the toilets of the enterprise.
After the August crisis, profits from the distribution of chocolate fell sharply, and Moscow investors decided to independently participate in the management of Altaikholodom. “As a result, the Altai enterprise was bought on shares: 60% - the share of Sitnikov and Romanenko, and 40% - ours,” recalls Dmitry Dokin. The value of the deal was not disclosed. According to Dokin, it amounted to several million dollars. A management team of Inmarko specialists was sent to the enterprise.
But by the end of 1998, it became obvious to the partners that they would not be able to do business together. Inmarko wanted to integrate Altaiholod into the overall structure of the company, which would allow for efficient pricing policy for the products of the Barnaul enterprise in the regions of Siberia. The Moscow shareholders wanted to independently develop a new business for themselves. As a result, Inmarko offered the partners either to sell them their 40% stake, or to buy out 10% from them, thereby bringing their participation in the business to parity. Muscovites accepted the first option. Alaiholod was headed by 30-year-old Andrey Sitnikov. They say that it is he who owns the authorship of the Russian Cold brand, developed specifically for federal business. The Barnaul Khladokombinat itself retained its former name. With the proceeds from the sale of its stake in Altaikholod, Inmarko bought a 35% stake in the Novosibirsk Khladokombinat.
Pros and cons of charisma
Competitors note the pressure and charisma of Andrey Sitnikov
Having gained control over Altaikholod, Messrs. Sitnikov and Romanenko automatically asked themselves questions about how to manage the new business and in what direction to develop it. After all, having sold its share, Inmarko immediately began to withdraw its managers and technologists from the Barnaul enterprise back to Omsk and Novosibirsk. The new owners did not have their own personnel. Then Andrey Sitnikov decided to keep specialists at the enterprise at all costs. A personnel war began between yesterday's partners. Production workers were offered a salary two to three times higher than at Inmarko enterprises. Many stayed.
With the disappearance of imported ice cream from the market, Russky Kholod quickly began to gain production momentum, and by the autumn of 1999 the company was successfully selling its own ice cream in large cities of Siberia and the Urals. “Before the default, a very large percentage of the ice cream market was imported, and primarily Polish products. With her disappearance, there was a real shortage of ice cream. All those companies that began to actively develop in 1999-2000 very quickly, as they say, jumped into the kings. The time turned out to be fertile for the Russian Cold. The deficit in the ice cream market continued until 2004,” says Dmitry Dokin.
In addition to attracting professional technologists On the other hand, the rapid success of Russian Cold was also facilitated by the distribution network for chocolate sales created by Andrey Sitnikov back in the first half of the 1990s. All trading branches of the Senate, which had been selling chocolate yesterday, were transferred to the distribution of ice cream. The headquarters of "Russian Cold" from the first days of the company's work was transferred to Moscow.
In 2000, in its second year of operation, Russkiy Kholod modernizes equipment and expands distribution by opening new branches in Vladivostok and Novosibirsk. In 2001-2002 branches appeared in Angarsk, Samara, Ulan-Ude, Nizhny Novgorod and Vologda. By 2006, the concern opened 14 branches throughout Russia.
Inmarko realized very quickly that not just another competitor in the Western Siberian market was born in Barnaul, but an ambitious company whose interests go far beyond Siberia. “I knew Andrei Sitnikov very well in order to understand how dynamic the expansion of Russian Cold would be. Against the background of the "red" directors, a young, stubborn, full of ideas manager appeared who knew not only what he wanted, but also how to achieve it quickly, - Dmitry Dokin admits. “However, there are always pluses and minuses in the charisma of a leader. The big disadvantage is that all decisions, as a rule, are made by Sitnikov alone, based solely on his vision of the situation. Moreover, this applies both to the development of a strategy for the years to come, and “churn”. I myself saw how the president of Russian Cold “explained to the designer how he needs to draw packaging.” “Russian Cold has very purposeful management. This is a company with a rigid structure that does not make unnecessary movements. If the decision is made, it is brought to the end, ”agrees with a colleague CEO Union of Ice Cream Workers of Russia (SMR) Valery Elkhov.
Away is boring
When introducing new brands to the market, Russkiy Kholod marketers at first looked for names for them that were consonant with Inmarko products.
The first brands of "Russian Cold" were emphatically Russian, and often even sovereign in nature: "Kedrovoe", "Honey", "Sobornoe", "Imperial". The packaging was distinguished by a golden color. The Senate's assortment also included Imperial chocolate - perhaps Andrey Sitnikov's "chocolate" past had an effect.
But very soon Russky Kholod began to produce trademarks that were in tune with the brands of the closest competitor in Siberia, the Inmarko company. The twin of the Inmarkovsky “Magnat” was the “Magnet” of the “Russian Cold”. In contrast to the Novosibirsk ice cream "Lubimy", the Altai product "Lubimoe" appeared, and the Inmarko brand, according to the company, became the prototype for the Nyumarka ice cream. In turn, Russkiy Kholod accused its competitor of launching the Russian Scope product, which Muscovites recognized as their Russkiy Kholod brand, by Inmarko. Vintage disputes in 2003 resulted in the signing of an agreement on good neighborliness in Krasnoyarsk. The companies agreed to respect each other in the market, not to speak badly about each other in the press, and also .. not to burn the competitor's booths (at that time there were cases of arson of Russian Cold booths in Yekaterinburg). Later, the agreement was supplemented with clauses stating that the Magnit brand was going to be liquidated in favor of Inmark's Tycoon, and the Lyubimy trademark was going to be liquidated in favor of Russkiy Kholod's Beloved.
In 2003, along with the production of ice cream, Altayholod began to salt and smoke fish, as well as the production semi-finished meat products(dumplings). The capacity of the fish processing plant is 150 tons per month. New lines of business today are almost not developed.
One playground, two playground
The ambitious plans of Russkiy Kholod to enter new markets and increase its share in the regional centers of the European part of the country made the company's management think about building another factory in the early 2000s. After all, approximately 50% of the products, according to the CMP, were received by Russky Kholod from placing orders at third-party facilities (private label). At that time, about 10 second-tier ice cream producers worked for Russky Kholod throughout the country (in Podolsk, Izhevsk, Tula and others). According to the results of 2005, the company's sales increased by more than 25% compared to the previous year. Today, the capacity of "Altaikholod" is estimated at 1760 tons of products per month.
The construction site "Russian Cold" was chosen in the Moscow region (the village of Oktyabrsky, Lyubertsy district, 12 km from Moscow). And after two years of construction, in the spring of 2006, the new production was launched. The design capacity of the factory was about 4 thousand tons of ice cream per month. The total investment is $30 million. The enterprise has installed modern Danish and Italian equipment worth more than $7 million. “Our factory has no equal in terms of technological equipment and production capacity,” says Sergey Trotsenko, Marketing Director of the Russkiy Kholod concern. — Large capacity allows us to provide all our Russian and foreign partners with ice cream on time and in full. The convenient location of the factory provides a significant reduction in the delivery time of products to the buyer.
Undoubtedly, with the opening of the factory, Russky Kholod gained a competitive advantage in European expansion over its closest competitor, Inmarko. Novosibirskers entered the Moscow market back in 2004 and each year only doubled their presence in the capital (they started with 3,000 freezers). “Of course, in Moscow with the launch of the factory it will become even more crowded, but it will be even more interesting to develop this market - it will not be us and not Russkiy Kholod that will leave it, but other more “calm” players,” Dmitry Dokin believes. Already today, Russian Cold has more than 200 kiosks in Moscow.
The factory is still not running at full capacity. Equipment installation continues. It is known that two production lines were brought to the Moscow Region enterprise from Altayholod. In 2006, the production capacity of the Moscow factory "Russian Cold" did not exceed 1840 tons of ice cream per month. Now the second stage of the refrigeration storage for 5,000 pallets is being completed at the Moscow enterprise, after which the company plans to start building the third stage for 20,000 pallets.
Gradually, with the increase in the capacity of the new factory, Russky Kholod almost completely refused to place orders for the production of ice cream under the brand name from other companies. “Today, at third-party facilities, we place orders only for the production of the most low-margin types of ice cream, primarily waffle cups. The transport component leads to a significant increase in the cost of this product. Since the spring of last year, all other types of Russian Cold ice cream have been produced exclusively at our facilities in the Moscow region and Barnaul, ”explains Sergey Trotsenko.
The level of technical equipment of enterprises allows the production of more than 150 types of ice cream of all main types: cones, popsicles, cups, briquettes, cakes, rolls, family, weight and soft ice cream.
In addition to building a production site in the Moscow region, Russky Kholod is actively strengthening the material and technical base of its branches. In 2005, a large office and warehouse complex was purchased in Yekaterinburg, new refrigerated warehouses were built in Omsk and Kaliningrad, and 3,500 freezer counters were placed in the regional centers of the country.
Export ice cream
At the end of September 2004, Altaikholoda ice cream, along with the products of the Lianozovsky Dairy Plant and the Lipetsk Cold Storage Plant, received accreditation on the European market (Euro number 1). The equipment at these enterprises was recognized by EU experts as corresponding to international safety standards. "Russian cold" to this event was 2.5 years. Has come new stage development of the company, which the top management of the concern is especially proud of. Although the first sales of the company abroad took place in 2001-2002. Then small batches of ice cream were exported to the USA and Israel.
The main consumers of Russian Cold products in the EU market are emigrants from Russia who have not yet forgotten the taste of Russian (Soviet) ice cream. First of all, the concern was interested in the German market, where about 5 million immigrants from Russia live, as well as Serbia, Montenegro and the Baltic countries. “Europeans were very surprised by the quality of Russian ice cream. Our product is not worse, if not better, than the European one,” Andrey Sitnikov, president of Russian Cold, told the media shortly after the start of ice cream supplies to Europe. According to the results of 2005, export deliveries of the company's products amounted to more than 500 tons.
However, market participants in the export of "Russian Cold" are ready to see only a marketing and PR move. “From the point of view of making a profit, export is far from the most important source for the company. Moreover, its volumes are not large - 5-7 tons per month. This is at the level of 5% of the total production of Russian Cold. At the same time, export gives the concern unconditional advantages, - says Mr. Elkhov from the SMP. — Firstly, this fact seriously raises the status of the company in the eyes of foreign colleagues and partners. Secondly, the supply of ice cream abroad makes the manufacturer more seriously deal with the management of the enterprise and monitor the quality of the products.”
“The sales volume of 5 tons per month is as much as we sell in only one microdistrict of Novosibirsk. This is an insignificant number. Moreover, raw materials are cheaper in Europe, the fund wages in terms of automation of production processes, it is lower, and the cost of electricity is comparable to the Russian one. Logistics costs must also be taken into account. It is impossible to compete on equal terms with European producers, bringing ice cream from Russia, - the chairman of the board of directors of Inmarko is convinced. - Having received a "European number", Russian manufacturers will never be able to enter any Western trading network, where ties with suppliers have been established for years, and the most important parameter is stability, not price. Dumping is impossible in Europe - no one there believes in the long-term dumping and the seriousness of the player offering low prices". According to Dmitry Dokin, before entering the markets of Europe, one must first enter the promising markets of the CIS and Mongolia, where Russian ice cream is well known.
Meanwhile, Russian Cold is not going to stop its export project. In May 2006, the US Department of Agriculture issued a license to supply Russian Cold branded ice cream to the US market. The company continues to take part in international exhibitions. Particularly in the Parisian international exhibition Food SIAL 2006 (October last year) Russkiy Kholod was the only Russian ice cream manufacturer to showcase its products. According to the company's press service, European market participants noted the quality of ice cream, bright, memorable packaging and acceptable price: "During the exhibition "Russian Cold" found new partners from France, Germany, England, Estonia, the Czech Republic and Israel."
Fight for stalls
In the conditions of the steady saturation of the ice cream market, the last two years were marked by the purchase of several retail chains in the largest cities of Siberia. As a result, at the beginning of 2006, the concern bought the Novosibirsk network of kiosks (28 units) of the Grand Gulliver company, as well as 23 kiosks and 1 thousand freezers from the Altai distributor Inmarko - PE Korostelev. Thus, the share of Russian Cold on the ice cream market in Barnaul increased from 65% to 85%, and in Novosibirsk from 15% to 20%. In May of the same year, Russian Cold bought a large independent retail operator in Novosibirsk - Trading house"Filippov" (about 100 stalls). This deal allowed Russian Cold to increase its Novosibirsk network by 80% (up to 223 kiosks) and almost equal the number of kiosks with its main competitor, Inmarko (250 kiosks).
In November 2006, it became known that Inmarko and Russkiy Kholod were simultaneously competing for the Novosibirsk network of ice cream kiosks Cheerful Van (57 kiosks, an asset of the Grospiron-M company). Inmarko came out the winner, bringing the total number of its kiosks in the Novosibirsk region to 310. “We considered the option of buying the Grospiron-M retail chain, but the price offered by the manufacturer, in our opinion, turned out to be unreasonably high,” Sergey Trotsenko admitted then. “We assessed this asset in terms of depreciation, payback, location, the emergency investment required to bring the kiosks up to our standards and came to the following conclusion: abandon these obsolete kiosks and focus on installing new ones in the city.” In total, the company has about 500 branded kiosks in Russian cities today. In addition to buying retail chains in the Moscow region, the concern launched a workshop for the production of kiosks.
To be or not to be?
The company has ambitious plans to increase production capacity not only at the Moscow Region enterprise (before the design ones), but also at the Barnaul factory. In February, the concern announced the start of the modernization of Altaiholod. The company will install new line, which will increase the capacity of the enterprise from 11.5 to 20 thousand tons of products per year. Investments in the modernization will amount to about $12 million. In addition, at the end of April, Altayholod held talks with representatives of the Swedish company Tetra Pak about the prospects for installing a line for the production of nutrilak (a product of deep processing of whey, which is released during cheese production). The cost of the project is $10 million.
The company's immediate plans include an IPO, and by 2008 an increase in revenue from $30 million to $200 million. the company must pass a three-year audit. In addition, Russian Cold is a completely non-transparent business.” “Apparently, for an IPO, they will need to become more transparent and answer a number of questions from potential investors,” agrees Valery Elkhov. In his opinion, today very good prospects to expand its share in the central region of the country: “Among the main market trends are the consolidation of companies and the reduction in the number of manufacturers. Large, efficiently operating enterprises become even more powerful, while small, poorly equipped enterprises are closed or bought up. This process is very noticeable in the central region. Therefore, the Moscow factory will definitely strengthen the position of Russian Cold on the market of Moscow and neighboring regions,” Mr. Elkhov believes.
As Dmitry Dokin told SU, for the past four years the shareholders of Russian Cold have been seriously discussing with Inmarko the possibility of merging the companies. However, the likelihood of this, according to Dokin, is still small: “Due to the closeness of Russian Cold, we don’t know for sure either about its capacities, or about sales volumes, or about the work of branches, not to mention financial indicators. It will be very difficult to unite brands, management, culture and much more.” In addition, Inmarko doubts that the price of Russian Cold will not be too high, although the very idea of consolidation with Russian Cold is not completely rejected. However, the top management of the company opposes such consolidation. “There are no grounds for talking about a merger between Russian Cold and Inmarko,” Alexander Terentyev told SU. “Personally, I am against it.”
"Russian cold" — one of the largest Russian ice cream producers, one of the three industry leaders (after Inmarko and Talosto). At the end of 2006, the concern's sales increased by 36% compared to the previous year and amounted to $102 million. In 2006, the production of ice cream at the two factories of Russkiy Kholod amounted to 26,000 tons, which is 30% more than in 2005. The company believes that the share of "Russian cold" in the Russian ice cream market is 10%. According to the Union of Ice Cream Workers of Russia, in 2006 the company's market share was 6.3%. The company's products are sold in 300 cities across the country.
The main brands of the company are Belochka, Golden Horn, Lakomka, Olimp, Imperial, Yubileinoye, Favorite, and Vignette rolls. In addition to its own brands, the concern produces under a license agreement a series of ice cream for children "Nyusha" and "Pin" under the brand name "Smeshariki". The share of licensed ice cream in the company's sales structure is about 10%.
Siberia is home to three major federal players on the Russian ice cream market: Inmarko (10.8% of the market), Russian Cold (6.3%) and Snezhny Gorodok (3%). One of the most dynamic and at the same time closed companies is the Russky Kholod concern. “Many experts are more or less aware of the ice cream market, but practically no one knows specifically about the Russkiy Kholod corporation,” said Dmitry Dokin, chairman of the board of directors of Inmarko OJSC. The corporation does not publish its financial statements and is extremely reluctant to comment on its actions. Observers note that the success of Russian Cold is the result of the management strategy of one person - the shareholder and president of the company, Andrei Sitnikov.
Together closely
In the "Russian Cold" itself, they talk very vaguely about the birth of the "cold giant". “Friends, Siberian entrepreneurs, owners of a wholesale company selling confectionery in Siberia and Europe, decided to found a new company that would produce Russian goods and trade with Asia, Europe and around the world. In 1999, after analyzing the market situation, it was decided to establish a company in Barnaul for the production and sale of ice cream, ”the press service of Russkiy Kholod told SU sparingly. In fact, these Siberian entrepreneurs were the Moscow dealer of Stollwerk (Alpen Gold) and the seller of his own brand Mainford (produced at the German factory Weinrish) Andrey Sitnikov and the Moscow dealer of Stollwerk and Mauxion Konstantin Romanenko. Later, they were joined by Alexander Terentiev (now the president of Altaikholod), who is related to the oil business. It is his market participants that today consider the main shareholder of "Russian Cold". Altaiholod, the largest ice cream manufacturer in Altai, was chosen as the company's production site.
Even earlier, in the summer of 1998, the shareholders of another Siberian player in the ice cream market, Inmarko, became interested in Altaiholod. This Novosibirsk company by that time had just completed the purchase of the Omsk cold storage plant. “By May 1998, we already had control over the enterprise in Omsk, and at that time we learned that Altaiholod was being sold. We decided to buy. But since large financial resources were invested in the purchase of the Omsk Khladokombinat, without a partner-co-investor, we would not have pulled this deal, ”recalls Dmitry Dokin. Among others, Inmarko's proposal was responded to by the company's long-term partner, the Moscow chocolate distributor Senat (the main brand is Mainford), represented by its director Andrei Sitnikov, a native of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, and his business colleague Konstantin Romanenko. Having studied the state of Altaiholod, they agreed to act as co-investors with Inmarko.
The production assets of the Barnaul enterprise (at that time the capacity was 600 tons of products per month) were worn out to the same extent as at most other large Siberian cold storage plants. The only noticeable difference, according to Mr. Dokin, was the European-style renovation made in the toilets of the enterprise.
After the August crisis, profits from the distribution of chocolate fell sharply, and Moscow investors decided to independently participate in the management of Altaikholodom. “As a result, the Altai enterprise was bought on shares: 60% - the share of Sitnikov and Romanenko, and 40% - ours,” recalls Dmitry Dokin. The value of the deal was not disclosed. According to Dokin, it amounted to several million dollars. A management team of Inmarko specialists was sent to the enterprise.
But by the end of 1998, it became obvious to the partners that they would not be able to do business together. "Inmarko" wanted to integrate "Altaikholod" into the general structure of the company, which would allow to conduct an effective pricing policy for the products of the Barnaul enterprise in the regions of Siberia. The Moscow shareholders wanted to independently develop a new business for themselves. As a result, Inmarko offered the partners either to sell them their 40% stake, or to buy out 10% from them, thereby bringing their participation in the business to parity. Muscovites accepted the first option. Alaiholod was headed by 30-year-old Andrey Sitnikov. They say that it is he who owns the authorship of the Russian Cold brand, developed specifically for federal business. The Barnaul Khladokombinat itself retained its former name. With the proceeds from the sale of its stake in Altaikholod, Inmarko bought a 35% stake in the Novosibirsk Khladokombinat.
Pros and cons of charisma
Competitors note the pressure and charisma of Andrey Sitnikov
Having gained control over Altaikholod, Messrs. Sitnikov and Romanenko automatically asked themselves questions about how to manage the new business and in what direction to develop it. After all, having sold its share, Inmarko immediately began to withdraw its managers and technologists from the Barnaul enterprise back to Omsk and Novosibirsk. The new owners did not have their own personnel. Then Andrey Sitnikov decided to keep specialists at the enterprise at all costs. A personnel war began between yesterday's partners. Production workers were offered a salary two to three times higher than at Inmarko enterprises. Many stayed.
With the disappearance of imported ice cream from the market, Russky Kholod quickly began to gain production momentum, and by the autumn of 1999 the company was successfully selling its own ice cream in large cities of Siberia and the Urals. “Before the default, a very large percentage of the ice cream market was imported, and primarily Polish products. With her disappearance, there was a real shortage of ice cream. All those companies that began to actively develop in 1999-2000 very quickly, as they say, jumped into the kings. The time turned out to be fertile for the Russian Cold. The deficit in the ice cream market continued until 2004,” says Dmitry Dokin.
In addition to attracting outside professional technologists to the company, the rapid success of Russian Cold was also facilitated by the distribution network for chocolate sales created by Andrey Sitnikov back in the first half of the 1990s. All trading branches of the Senate, which had been selling chocolate yesterday, were transferred to the distribution of ice cream. The headquarters of "Russian Cold" from the first days of the company's work was transferred to Moscow.
In 2000, in its second year of operation, Russkiy Kholod modernizes equipment and expands distribution by opening new branches in Vladivostok and Novosibirsk. In 2001-2002 branches appeared in Angarsk, Samara, Ulan-Ude, Nizhny Novgorod and Vologda. By 2006, the concern opened 14 branches throughout Russia.
Inmarko realized very quickly that not just another competitor in the Western Siberian market was born in Barnaul, but an ambitious company whose interests go far beyond Siberia. “I knew Andrei Sitnikov very well in order to understand how dynamic the expansion of Russian Cold would be. Against the background of the "red" directors, a young, stubborn, full of ideas manager appeared who knew not only what he wanted, but also how to achieve it quickly, - Dmitry Dokin admits. “However, there are always pluses and minuses in the charisma of a leader. The big disadvantage is that all decisions, as a rule, are made by Sitnikov alone, based solely on his vision of the situation. Moreover, this applies both to the development of a strategy for the years to come, and “churn”. I myself saw how the president of Russian Cold “explained to the designer how he needs to draw packaging.” “Russian Cold has very purposeful management. This is a company with a rigid structure that does not make unnecessary movements. If a decision is made, it is carried through to the end,” agrees Valery Elkhov, Director General of the Union of Ice Cream Workers of Russia (SMR), with his colleague.
Away is boring
When introducing new brands to the market, Russkiy Kholod marketers at first looked for names for them that were consonant with Inmarko products.
The first brands of "Russian Cold" were emphatically Russian, and often even sovereign in nature: "Kedrovoe", "Honey", "Sobornoe", "Imperial". The packaging was distinguished by a golden color. The Senate's assortment also included Imperial chocolate - perhaps Andrey Sitnikov's "chocolate" past had an effect.
But very soon Russky Kholod began to produce trademarks that were consonant with the brands of the closest competitor in Siberia, the Inmarko company. The twin of the Inmarkovsky “Magnat” was the “Magnet” of the “Russian Cold”. In contrast to the Novosibirsk ice cream "Lubimy", the Altai product "Lubimoe" appeared, and the Inmarko brand, according to the company, became the prototype for the Nyumarka ice cream. In turn, Russkiy Kholod accused its competitor of launching the Russian Scope product, which Muscovites recognized as their Russkiy Kholod brand, by Inmarko. Vintage disputes in 2003 resulted in the signing of an agreement on good neighborliness in Krasnoyarsk. The companies agreed to respect each other in the market, not to speak badly about each other in the press, and also .. not to burn the competitor's booths (at that time there were cases of arson of Russian Cold booths in Yekaterinburg). Later, the agreement was supplemented with clauses stating that the Magnit brand was liquidated in favor of Inmark's Tycoon, and the Lyubimy trademark was liquidated in favor of Russkiy Kholod's Lyubimy.
In 2003, along with the production of ice cream, "Altaikholod" began to be engaged in salting and smoking fish, as well as the production of meat semi-finished products (dumplings). The capacity of the fish processing plant is 150 tons per month. New lines of business today are almost not developed.
One playground, two playground
The ambitious plans of Russkiy Kholod to enter new markets and increase its share in the regional centers of the European part of the country made the company's management think about building another factory in the early 2000s. After all, approximately 50% of the products, according to the CMP, were received by Russky Kholod from placing orders at third-party facilities (private label). At that time, about 10 second-tier ice cream producers worked for Russky Kholod throughout the country (in Podolsk, Izhevsk, Tula and others). According to the results of 2005, the company's sales increased by more than 25% compared to the previous year. Today, the capacity of "Altaikholod" is estimated at 1760 tons of products per month.
The construction site "Russian Cold" was chosen in the Moscow region (the village of Oktyabrsky, Lyubertsy district, 12 km from Moscow). And after two years of construction, in the spring of 2006, the new production was launched. The design capacity of the factory was about 4 thousand tons of ice cream per month. The total investment is $30 million. The enterprise has installed modern Danish and Italian equipment worth more than $7 million. “Our factory has no equal in terms of technological equipment and production capacity,” says Sergey Trotsenko, Marketing Director of the Russkiy Kholod concern. “High capacity allows us to provide all our Russian and foreign partners with ice cream on time and in full. The convenient location of the factory provides a significant reduction in the delivery time of products to the buyer.
Undoubtedly, with the opening of the factory, Russky Kholod gained a competitive advantage in European expansion over its closest competitor, Inmarko. Novosibirskers entered the Moscow market back in 2004 and each year only doubled their presence in the capital (they started with 3,000 freezers). “Of course, in Moscow with the launch of the factory it will become even more crowded, but it will be even more interesting to develop this market - it will not be us and not Russkiy Kholod that will leave it, but other more “calm” players,” Dmitry Dokin believes. Already today, Russian Cold has more than 200 kiosks in Moscow.
The factory is still not running at full capacity. Equipment installation continues. It is known that two production lines were brought to the Moscow Region enterprise from Altayholod. In 2006, the production capacity of the Moscow factory "Russian Cold" did not exceed 1840 tons of ice cream per month. Now the second stage of the refrigeration storage for 5,000 pallets is being completed at the Moscow enterprise, after which the company plans to start building the third stage for 20,000 pallets.
Gradually, with the increase in the capacity of the new factory, Russky Kholod almost completely refused to place orders for the production of ice cream under the brand name from other companies. “Today, at third-party facilities, we place orders only for the production of the most low-margin types of ice cream, primarily waffle cups. The transport component leads to a significant increase in the cost of this product. Since the spring of last year, all other types of Russian Cold ice cream have been produced exclusively at our facilities in the Moscow region and Barnaul, ”explains Sergey Trotsenko.
The level of technical equipment of enterprises allows the production of more than 150 types of ice cream of all main types: cones, popsicles, cups, briquettes, cakes, rolls, family, weight and soft ice cream.
In addition to building a production site in the Moscow region, Russky Kholod is actively strengthening the material and technical base of its branches. In 2005, a large office and warehouse complex was purchased in Yekaterinburg, new refrigerated warehouses were built in Omsk and Kaliningrad, and 3,500 freezer counters were placed in the regional centers of the country.
Export ice cream
At the end of September 2004, Altaikholoda ice cream, along with the products of the Lianozovsky Dairy Plant and the Lipetsk Cold Storage Plant, received accreditation on the European market (Euro number 1). The equipment at these enterprises was recognized by EU experts as corresponding to international safety standards. "Russian cold" to this event was 2.5 years. A new stage in the development of the company has begun, which the top management of the concern is especially proud of. Although the first sales of the company abroad took place in 2001-2002. Then small batches of ice cream were exported to the USA and Israel.
The main consumers of Russian Cold products in the EU market are emigrants from Russia who have not yet forgotten the taste of Russian (Soviet) ice cream. First of all, the concern was interested in the German market, where about 5 million immigrants from Russia live, as well as Serbia, Montenegro and the Baltic countries. “Europeans were very surprised by the quality of Russian ice cream. Our product is no worse, if not better, than the European one,” Andrey Sitnikov, president of Russian Cold, told the media shortly after the start of ice cream supplies to Europe. According to the results of 2005, export deliveries of the company's products amounted to more than 500 tons.
However, market participants in the export of "Russian Cold" are ready to see only a marketing and PR move. “From the point of view of making a profit, export is far from the most important source for the company. Moreover, its volumes are not large - 5-7 tons per month. This is at the level of 5% of the total production of Russian Cold. At the same time, export gives the concern unconditional advantages, - says Mr. Elkhov from the SMP. — Firstly, this fact seriously raises the status of the company in the eyes of foreign colleagues and partners. Secondly, the supply of ice cream abroad makes the manufacturer more seriously deal with the management of the enterprise and monitor the quality of the products.”
“The sales volume of 5 tons per month is as much as we sell in only one microdistrict of Novosibirsk. This is an insignificant number. Moreover, raw materials are cheaper in Europe, the wage fund is lower in the conditions of automation of production processes, and the cost of electricity is comparable to that in Russia. Logistics costs must also be taken into account. It is impossible to compete on equal terms with European producers, bringing ice cream from Russia, - the chairman of the board of directors of Inmarko is convinced. - Having received a "European number", Russian manufacturers will never be able to enter any Western trading network, where ties with suppliers have been established for years, and the most important parameter is stability, not price. Dumping is impossible in Europe – no one there believes in the long-term nature of dumping and the seriousness of the player offering low prices to chains.” According to Dmitry Dokin, before entering the markets of Europe, one must first enter the promising markets of the CIS and Mongolia, where Russian ice cream is well known.
Meanwhile, Russian Cold is not going to stop its export project. In May 2006, the US Department of Agriculture issued a license to supply Russian Cold branded ice cream to the US market. The company continues to take part in international exhibitions. In particular, at the Paris international food exhibition SIAL 2006 (October last year), Russian Cold was the only Russian ice cream manufacturer to demonstrate its products. According to the company's press service, European market participants noted the quality of ice cream, bright, memorable packaging and reasonable price: "During the exhibition, Russian Cold found new partners from France, Germany, England, Estonia, the Czech Republic and Israel."
Fight for stalls
In the conditions of the steady saturation of the ice cream market, the last two years were marked by the purchase of several retail chains in the largest cities of Siberia for Russkiy Kholod. As a result, at the beginning of 2006, the concern bought the Novosibirsk network of kiosks (28 units) of the Grand Gulliver company, as well as 23 kiosks and 1 thousand freezers from the Altai distributor Inmarko - PE Korostelev. Thus, the share of Russian Cold on the ice cream market in Barnaul increased from 65% to 85%, and in Novosibirsk from 15% to 20%. In May of the same year, Russian Cold bought a large independent retail operator in Novosibirsk - the Filippov Trading House (about 100 kiosks). This deal allowed Russian Cold to increase its Novosibirsk network by 80% (up to 223 kiosks) and almost equal the number of kiosks with its main competitor, Inmarko (250 kiosks).
In November 2006, it became known that Inmarko and Russkiy Kholod were simultaneously competing for the Novosibirsk network of ice cream kiosks Cheerful Van (57 kiosks, an asset of the Grospiron-M company). Inmarko came out the winner, bringing the total number of its kiosks in the Novosibirsk region to 310. “We considered the option of buying the Grospiron-M retail chain, but the price offered by the manufacturer, in our opinion, turned out to be unreasonably high,” Sergey Trotsenko admitted then. “We assessed this asset in terms of depreciation, payback, location, the emergency investment required to bring the kiosks up to our standards and came to the following conclusion: abandon these obsolete kiosks and focus on installing new ones in the city.” In total, the company has about 500 branded kiosks in Russian cities today. In addition to buying retail chains in the Moscow region, the concern launched a workshop for the production of kiosks.
To be or not to be?
The company has ambitious plans to increase production capacity not only at the Moscow region enterprise (to the design level), but also at the Barnaul factory. In February, the concern announced the start of the modernization of Altaiholod. A new line will be installed at the enterprise, which will increase the enterprise's capacity from 11.5 to 20 thousand tons of products per year. Investments in the modernization will amount to about $12 million. In addition, at the end of April, Altayholod held talks with representatives of the Swedish company Tetra Pak about the prospects for installing a line for the production of nutrilak (a product of deep processing of whey, which is released during cheese production). The cost of the project is $10 million.
The company's immediate plans include an IPO, and by 2008 an increase in revenue from $30 million to $200 million. the company must pass a three-year audit. In addition, Russian Cold is a completely non-transparent business.” “Apparently, for an IPO, they will need to become more transparent and answer a number of questions from potential investors,” agrees Valery Elkhov. In his opinion, very good prospects have opened up for Russkiy Kholod to expand its share in the central region of the country: “Among the main market trends are the consolidation of companies and the reduction in the number of manufacturers. Large, efficiently operating enterprises become even more powerful, while small, poorly equipped enterprises are closed or bought up. This process is very noticeable in the central region. Therefore, the Moscow factory will certainly strengthen the position of Russian Cold on the market of Moscow and the surrounding regions,” Mr. Elkhov believes.
As Dmitry Dokin told SU, for the past four years the shareholders of Russian Cold have been seriously discussing with Inmarko the possibility of merging the companies. However, the likelihood of this, according to Dokin, is still small: “Due to the closeness of Russian Cold, we don’t know for sure either about its capacities, or about sales volumes, or about the work of branches, not to mention financial indicators. It will be very difficult to unite brands, management, culture and much more.” In addition, Inmarko doubts that the price of Russian Cold will not be too high, although the very idea of consolidation with Russian Cold is not completely rejected. However, the top management of the company opposes such consolidation. “There are no grounds for talking about a merger between Russian Cold and Inmarko,” Alexander Terentyev told SU. “Personally, I am against it.”
"Russian cold"— one of the largest Russian ice cream producers, one of the three industry leaders (after Inmarko and Talosto). At the end of 2006, the concern's sales increased by 36% compared to the previous year and amounted to $102 million. In 2006, the production of ice cream at the two factories of Russkiy Kholod amounted to 26,000 tons, which is 30% more than in 2005. The company believes that the share of "Russian cold" in the Russian ice cream market is 10%. According to the Union of Ice Cream Workers of Russia, in 2006 the company's market share was 6.3%. The company's products are sold in 300 cities across the country.
The main brands of the company are Belochka, Golden Horn, Lakomka, Olimp, Imperial, Yubileinoye, Favorite, and Vignette rolls. In addition to its own brands, the concern produces under a license agreement a series of ice cream for children "Nyusha" and "Pin" under the brand name "Smeshariki". The share of licensed ice cream in the company's sales structure is about 10%.
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