Red Bull aims to enter China next year
Austrian TimesRed Bull is setting its sights on China, it has emerged.
Dietrich Mateschitz, head of the company based in Fuschl near Salzburg, said the plan was to enter the Chinese market next year.
The company boss, who rarely speaks to the press, told the German Lebensmittel Zeitung newspaper: 'We’ve just left the first base camp on our climb to the top.'
Mateschitz said he saw the potential of selling up to eight billion cans of the firm’s trademark drink a year. Nearly four billion units of Red Bull went over the counter last year, and the Austrian businessman claimed his firm will have sold 4.2 billion cans by the end of this year.
Red Bull, which is not listed on the stock market, is the strongest Austrian brand in the world with an estimated value of 12 billion Euros.
The firm raked in just 11 million Euros in its first year of doing business in 1987 while having spent three million Euros more on marketing initiatives at the same time. Red Bull’s annual turnover has ranged at around three to four billion Euros in the past few years.
The company’s trademark energy drink is on sale in 160 countries all over the world. Its attempts to make its Simply Cola drink, which was introduced in 2008, into an equivalent rival of market leader Coca Cola have however failed. Red Bull’s range of a healthy drink range called Carpe Diem has also failed to take off.
Red Bull started to sponsor world class athletes like former ski jumper Andreas Goldberger more than 10 years ago. The energy drinks powerhouse today sponsors dozens of athletes from all over the world like snowboarder Shaun White and race drivers Sebastien Loeb and Sebastian Vettel.
The company currently runs football clubs on four continents after having entered the field by acquiring the Austrian Bundesliga licence of Austria Salzburg to relabel the side into Red Bull Salzburg five years ago.
Austrian TV station ServusTV, weekly glossy Seitenblicke Magazin, monthly sports and lifestyle magazine Red Bulletin and construction company Bull Bau are also part of the Red Bull empire.
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