A new K70 million plant represents a big step forward for Pacific Industries. Director Everett Chue tells Business Advantage PNG that the facility will also provide a range of benefits to his business.

Pacific Industries’ new Pepsi can and PET facility in Port Moresby. Credit: Pacific Industries

After winning the exclusive PepsiCo bottling licence for PNG back in 2018, local manufacturer Pacific Industries has experienced more than six years of solid growth and is now seeing the positive benefits of the Pepsi partnership fizz over into other areas of its business.

“There are huge efficiencies with having two manufacturing plants, the first being shipping.”

Everett Chue, Director at Pacific Industries, says the steady growth meant the food and beverage manufacturer had little option but to add to the Rabaul factory that had been its sole production facility since before the Second World War.

This led it to invest in a new Port Moresby facility with can and PET (polyethylene terephthalate) lines, which it commissioned in November 2024.

Large investment

“It was a K70 million-plus investment, and there’s additional things that we’re adding into that investment, like more storage space, increasing the size of our workshop and refrigeration,” Chue tells Business Advantage PNG.

“On top of that, there are huge efficiencies with having two manufacturing plants, the first being shipping. If I produce in Rabaul, it is a minimum of 14 days to get it to Port Moresby. There are costs and delays, so your speed to market is improved by having two factories.”

The contingency of having two factories will also help Pacific Industries deal with some of the more unpredictable elements of doing business in PNG.

“In Rabaul, this year and last year there’s been quite a big increase in law and order issues,” Chue says.

“There’s been rioting there. And when that happens, our staff can’t get into town, and so we can’t produce, the wharf shuts down, customs can’t clear raw materials coming in. We’ve lost significant production days, I think almost about 30 days over a year.”

Chue estimates the company has also lost K10 million over the past six years to power disruptions.

Future involves “big growth”

Chue says his firm has been gearing up for potential increases in demand once final investment decisions are made on big resources projects such as Papua LNG.

But even without those projects, he says he is “very optimistic about the growth of the PNG economy”.

Pacific Industries is planning a K10 million upgrade of its ice cream factory and the creation of a new distribution facility on newly purchased land in Mt Hagen.

Underpinning the company’s growth is its embrace of PNG’s informal economy.

The company has a channel manager at all 11 of its branches whose job it is to identify potential vendors who have a car, cash flow and some business nous.

These vendors typically sell from home, the roadside or a permanent market stall. The channel manager provides each vendor with a package including an esky (cooler), umbrella, cap, a T-shirt and free ice.

These informal sales channels now represent a “high single digits” share of Pacific’s overall beverage sales and will likely lead to more investments in future.

“We are expecting big growth, with obviously gaining share in the market, but also with the economy growing a lot in the next five years,” Chue says.

“We’ve planned the PET line for five years of growth. We’ve made contingencies to be able to expand certain machinery that will increase the line.”