Come next year, Barbados and the rest of the world will have to pay more for products from this country’s largest rum producer, Mount Gay Distilleries.
This was disclosed by managing director of Mount Gay Distilleries, Raphael Grisoni, who said the series of global challenges and other exogenous shocks, had “significantly” increased cost of inputs, adding that despite the best efforts to absorb those costs, some of it must now be passed on to customers domestically, regionally and internationally.
However, Grisoni did not reveal the percentage of increase anticipated but said the idea going forward was to give the customer more bang for their buck.
He explained that the vast majority of inputs necessary for production were imported and therefore subject to global logistical issues such as the fuel increases, Ukraine War and COVID-19.
“Our secret thus far has been the agility of our staff and our forecasting, but unfortunately at the end of the day the consumer is going to be impacted. This is due to the inflation of our cost, inflation of all raw material and inflation on the logistical side, which is tremendous.
“We are supporting it and we are trying as best we can when we export to our key market not to pass on this price increase,” Grisoni said, while making it clear that these challenges were by no means unique to the industry in Barbados. (CLM)