Top Brands on the “upside” of the crisis: We bought a dairy plant cheap

TBD, the biggest distributor of Philip Morris and Kraft Foods on the Romanian market, with over 300 million euros in turnover, has put an investment project in Neamt county on hold because last year the shortage of cash on the market enabled it to buy a dairy plant at a low price.

The most important thing for a distributor last year was cash management, because, in the absence of bank funding, small retailers resorted to loans from suppliers, according to Wael El Ghadban, general manager and owner of 50% of Top Brands Distribution, the second-largest distributor on the FMCG market.

"Since 2009 we have been seeking to recover almost 2 million euros from the market. The upside is these debts are backed by real estate collateral, such as homes and warehouses, but we want to recover our money, not take over the assets. During these times, cash is more important than assets," El Ghadban says.

However, retailers' biggest creditors are banks, according to market information, with El Ghadban stressing that foreclosures of bad payers by banks could make up the second wave of the crisis, in the context where consumption is not showing signs of a rebound, either.