Foods give ITC an appetite for diversification, recipe for margin expansion

The largest chunk of the tobacco major's non-cigarettes FMCG portfolio is growing rapidly on the back of hectic brand building, acquisitions, and new ventures

The slow-cooked whole black lentils in a tomato gravy, “Dal Bukhara”, a signature dish of ITC Maurya that has often earned high praise from some of the world’s most powerful leaders, including US President Bill Clinton, hit the supermarkets in a ready-to-eat format in 2001.

The launch under the “Kitchens of India” brand had marked ITC’s foray into the non-cigarettes fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) space. In the next two decades, an avalanche of launches across multiple vectors – foods, personal care, education and stationery products, agarbattis – followed to create one of India’s largest FMCG players.

Revenues started kicking in