Kwality Walls ahead of Amul: HLL

With summer almost here, Hindustan Lever (HLL) has claimed that it was ahead of Amul in the ice-cream market. The company is also planning to further consolidate its position with the launch of five new flavours.

J H Mehta, executive director (ice cream) of HLL, said: "There is no third-party independent audit available now for market shares as AC Nielsen-ORG has stopped measuring market share for ice-creams.

"However, an excellent surrogate measure is the excise duty paid. During 2003, HLL paid excise duty of Rs.15.7 crore on ice-cream. In a comparable period (April 03- March 04), Amul paid total excise duty of Rs 8.59 crore on the entire milk and milk products portfolio as per their published accounts. Assuming that this entire duty paid by Amul related to ice-cream only, their market share is clearly significantly below Kwality Walls," Mehta said.

The company will be launching five new ice-creams this summer to further increase its market share, he added.