Over three years Belwest doubles exports to Latvia

In 2007, the exports of Vitebsk-based Belwest to Latvia amounted to $3 million, up 50% over the past three years. The deliveries to that country are handled by a representative office of the company in Latvia and several Latvian dealers, BelTA was told in the Belarusian embassy to Latvia. Belarusian footwear has taken its market niche in Latvia. Belwest has developed a network of chain stores and won its customer base. “The sales have been growing and we can say that we have found our customers in Latvia,” the embassy said. Another facility of the commodity distribution network of Belarus in Latvia, OOO Belpischeprom, greatly contributes to the increase of exports to that country. It has been created with participation of Belarusian capital and represents the interests of the food industry (seven distilleries and Mozyrsol white salt manufacturer). Over the past three years the deliveries of strong drinks have increased 7 times from $236 thousand in 2004 году to $1 million 730 thousand in 2007. The company has also started deliveries of Belarusian products to other countries of the European Union using the geological advantages of Latvia as a big transit centre in the region. These examples are typical of the classical commodity distribution network when a representative office is set up in another country to handle wholesale and retail trade. The Belarusian-Latvian cooperation has other examples when joint investment work under other schemes which are more promising. For example, two biggest lingerie producers “Lauma (Latvua) and “Milavitsa” (Belarus) cooperate through a strategic investor, Estonia’s Silvano Investment Group, which shareholders include Italian Iluna Group. Within the framework of this project significant investments have been attracted to promote products to other countries. Thus, the two companies have become partners developing a joint strategy, distributing the orders and exchanging technological solutions. The partnership has yielded its benefits. Today the lingerie producers have the network of 36 multi-brand stores “Oblicie” and 23 one-brand stores “Milavitsa”. The plans on the table are to increase the number of stores to 400 in the CIS including Russia and Ukraine and several EU countries.