Key Points:

Lasco Manufacturing will add a new Italian filling plant by year-end, boosting output 40% under a $1.1b retooling plan.

Revenue rose 3% to March 2025; Q1 sales fell 10% to $2.9b as profits slipped to $618m.

The upgrade targets efficiency, export growth and cost cuts with further equipment investment ahead.

Lasco Manufacturing Limited, the maker of the popular iCool brand, should have a new processing and filling plant installed at its White Marl, St Catherine facility just in time for the high-volume festive season.

The new line, sourced from Italy, is expected to boost beverage output by 40 per cent when it comes on stream within the next three months.

Director Vincent Chen, who chaired the meeting in the absence of Chairman James Rawle, confirmed the timeline at Friday’s annual general meeting and told shareholders the investment is part of a wider $1.1-billion retooling programme running through 2026.

“It will soon be up and running in another three months and once that gets going and we start to generate money, we are going to look for other ways to expand. So we’re not sleeping,” he said.

The project, positioned as the lever to turn the company around in the coming months through improved efficiency, comes against the backdrop of slowing sales growth.

For the financial year ended March 2025, revenue rose by only 3 per cent — down sharply from 18.6 per cent two years earlier — even as net profit edged up 8 per cent to $2.2 billion. Deputy General Manager Lisa Watt said the softer performance reflected a contraction in the local market and wider global headwinds.

That pressure carried into the new financial year.

For the three months ended June 30, 2025, sales revenue contracted 10 per cent to $2.92 billion compared with double-digit growth a year earlier. Meanwhile, net profit eased to $618.3 million from $701.7 million in the prior year, even as operating discipline kept selling and administrative expenses in check.

The expansion is also aimed at creating the breathing room Lasco needs to defend and deepen its position in a highly competitive fast-moving consumer goods sector both locally and overseas.

Last year, the company disclosed that it had signed on with a major US retail partner to carry its products — a deal that is expected to expand distribution beyond the Caribbean diaspora market. While management has not yet revealed the full scope of that arrangement, executives indicated at the time that it forms part of Lasco’s wider push to leverage its stronger capacity into export growth.

The company’s portfolio ranges from flagship powdered products such as Lasco Food Drink, LaSoy and its oats porridge mix to enriched milk products and its iCool line of waters, juices and carbonated drinks. More recently, Lasco has leaned on beverages as a growth engine, but executives say older lines remain a staple of household consumption.

“As our equipment ages, it becomes less efficient. Retooling is necessary to deliver the efficiency and the return on assets that we need,” Watt explained. She added that the new line “will no doubt have a significant impact” on productivity while freeing capacity to support exports, new product development and more aggressive brand marketing.

Shareholders, however, pressed management on what they see as a “declining trajectory” in revenue growth and a weakening return on assets. Watt acknowledged the challenge but pointed to the retooling programme, product innovation and export expansion as the foundation for restoring double-digit growth.

Beyond the new plant, Lasco Manufacturing, which is one of the three-pronged Lasco affiliated companies, also plans to pump cash into compressors, pumps and an expanded ozonation system — investments designed to trim costs, enhance quality, and support Lasco’s long-term aim of becoming more resilient in the face of supply chain and geopolitical shocks.

The company has budgeted capital of $1.1 billion spanning 2024 to 2026, but says it has already invested $425 million in the just-ended financial year, with the balance to be spent over the next two years.