The East African Portland Cement Company (EAPCC) is enhancing dealer and distributor incentives to push sales in the midst of Covid-19 pandemic which has deflated consumer demand.
During a series of meet the distributors tour of the Nyandarau county over the weekend , the company’s acting CEO Stephen Nthei said the visit forms part of the wider company strategy to understand and attend to consumers and distributors challenges.
” Covid-19 has had quite an impact in sales of cement. But we are seeing a bounce back as businesses start requesting for orders,” Nthei said.
The revised incentives focus on rewarding higher sales performance and offering price discounts to distributors.
“Dealers and distributors will get more incentives which they will be able to transfer to customers in the form of discounts on the order,” he said.
Kenya’s cement consumption dropped by 8.3 per cent in April, as the Covid-19 containment measures announced by the government in late March took a toll on construction activity.
Latest data from the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics shows that the country consumed 505,958 tonnes in April, down from 551,914 tonnes in March.
Speaking on the firm’s turnaround effort , Nthei expressed confidence in the measures being implemented by the board, saying they will be successful.
“We are almost on the last lap as far as the turnaround is concerned. We should be winding up on our staff restructuring program. This will accord us a firm foundation to manage our staff costs and increase our working capital ,” he said.
EAPCC’s net loss widened to Sh1.5 billion in the six months to December 2019 from Sh1.2 billion in a similar period in 2018.
Staff costs were at an estimated Sh4 billion last year, consuming up to 80 per cent of the company’s sales, which were recorded at Sh5 billion in 2018.