That this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Ms. Runjhun Jain from Ernst & Young. Thank you, and over to you, ma'am.
Thank you so much, Michael. Good afternoon, friends, and we welcome you to the Q3 and FY, Q3 nine-month FY 2024 earnings call of Sula Vineyards Limited. To take us through the results and to answer your questions, we have with us the top management from Sula, represented by Mr. Rajeev Samant, CEO; Karan Vasani, Chief Operating Officer; and Abhishek Kapoor, the Chief Financial Officer. We'll start with a brief overview of the quarter gone by, by Rajeev, which will give you a broad highlight of the business trends and what he's observing in the market. This will be followed by Abhishek with the financials. We'll then open the floor to Q&A for after this. Numerous factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statement.
New factors emerge from time to time, and it's not possible for management to predict all such factors, as is the case, to the extent to which any combination of factors may impact Sula's business or cause results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statement. Sula also undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements to reflect developments that occur after the statement is made. With that said, I will now hand over to you, Rajeev. Over to you.
Thanks, Runjhun. Good afternoon to all of you. I welcome you all to our Q3 and nine-month FY 2024 earnings conference call. Thanks for taking the time to join us this afternoon. This is our seventh consecutive quarter of record, quarterly revenue and profits, resulting in an all-time high in terms of revenue, EBITDA, and PAT, in this Q3 for any quarter. In Q3, revenues grew by around 4% YOY, and 6.5% net of excise revenue, reaching a total of INR 217 crore. I would like to shed light on lower growth this quarter by highlighting two key factors. First one, higher S&D spends, especially in Maharashtra, our number one market, which has gained us market share but has resulted in the net revenue looking lower than the gross revenue and gross billings for the first time.
That has been a key factor in having a slightly subdued top line growth in this quarter. Our largest market, Maharashtra, gross billings were up 15%, but net revenue, however, increased by only 9% on account of almost a 25% increase in our S&D. We have been pushing more S&D into the market. We do believe, however, that we have peaked in terms of S&D spend in Q3, and after this, I do believe S&D will either stabilize or, in fact, even go downwards. In distribution markets like Maharashtra, S&D expenses are directly removed from the top lines to get to the net revenues. It's been a similar scenario in the rest of the country, and overall S&D expenses are up over 20% in Q3.
We've been very aggressive in the market in this quarter, and I'm pleased to say that we have grown market share in all the major markets where we get market share information with this strategy. We've taken back market share from some of our competitors in this time. Despite this large increase in S&D, we are pleased to be reporting an all-time high EBITDA margin of 33.7%, and our PAT margin has risen to close to 20%, 19.8%. That's a growth of 98 basis points compared to YOY Q3. Another market which has impacted our top line growth is Goa, the most important tourist market in the country and traditionally a very important market for us in Q3.
However, Goa, in this Q3, has faced a lot of licensing issues, resulting in a very soft October and November. In fact, degrowth in October and November. There has been a lag from the government side in granting retail licenses as well as beach shack licenses. However, these issues have been resolved, and there was a swift rebound in December. December was strong, and Q4 is looking very strong, so we do anticipate Goa to get back to good growth in Q4. The good news looking forward is that Q4 is definitely looking stronger than Q3 in terms of revenue growth, and we fully anticipate at this point, midway into Q4, returning to double-digit growth for our own brands, as has been the trend in the previous seven or eight quarters before Q3.
Our focused efforts on the higher end segment, that is our elite and premium, has succeeded in increasing their share of our sales to 77% in value terms in Q3, and that's up from 74% a year ago. So our premiumization story is still very much intact, and we do believe that that's going to continue to play out for some time to come.... So elite and premium has grown by 7%, while popular and economy de-grew by 6%. We've repeatedly said that this is not a very exciting segment for us, the lower price segment. There's a lot of competition and very heavy discounting and low profitability. So we are very firmly focused on wines costing above INR 700, and that's where we are gaining the market share.
In other good news, our world-renowned wine tourism business has done very well in this quarter, with growth of over 16%. Within this, I'm especially happy to note a 30% jump in tastings, which is a very important factor and metric for us. Tastings is what is gonna build this business, get more and more people into drinking wine, into awareness, and into being comfortable with which wine they like and which they order. So I think that's a pretty impressive result by our tastings team. We did close to 75,000 tastings at our various facilities in this quarter, and that's a pretty impressive number, and that's something that's gonna pay rich dividends going forward.
I want to note here that no other consumer company in India has anything like this beautiful property of ours, especially in Nashik and also outside Karnataka, and that really sets us apart in giving us such a great springboard continuously for future growth. So wine tourism has been continuously setting records, especially on the extended holiday weekends. In December 24, we achieved milestones, welcoming over 5,000 visitors in a single day. That was a record, and it was record-breaking on all fronts, new highs in revenue, visitor numbers, tastings. And then again, on Republic Day, on the long weekend, once again, we had our highest single-day revenue and tastings, breaking the record set on December 24.
So Q4 has begun on a very positive note, very strong January bookings, occupancies, et cetera, and we're looking forward to strong double-digit growth in Q4 for our wine tourism business. As we have now completed our one year milestone since listing, I just want to point out that we are very pleased to have delivered over a 70% return to those shareholders who invested in the IPO. And I do hope that, in fact, this is just the beginning. One thing that I'm very proud of in this is our efforts in sustainability, climate mitigation, climate readiness. We're very much leaders in this, in fact, part of a worldwide sort of top 10 list. I'll come to that. We recognize climate change as a significant risk, and we are very proactive in implementing measures to mitigate its impact.
We take pride in being among the first 10 wineries globally and the first winery in Asia to have earned the prestigious International Wineries for Climate Action Gold status, alongside legendary wine companies such as Familia Torres of Spain and Jackson Family Wines of, of the U.S. These are global giants, and it gives us great pride to be in this august company. Currently, we have now over 3 MW of our own on-site solar power capacity, enabling us to meet 60% of our energy needs through our own renewable sources, and we've set ourselves a target, and we already have plans in place to achieve over 70% in the near future. I would say before the end of FY 2025, we should be at over 70%. A word on the harvest that is now underway, the 2024 harvest.
I'm very pleased to say that it's looking excellent in terms of quality and quantity. This is going to be our fourth excellent harvest in a row, and, you know, that's easy to say. What you don't see is the hard work that goes on from our teams, our viticulture teams, behind the scenes in making this happen, in mitigating the impact of climate change, global warming. So they're continuously doing so much work to ensure that even if there are some unseasonal events, Sula is relatively unaffected. You would note that in various other parts of the wine world over the last few years, pretty much every region in the wine world has been impacted in some way or the other in at least, one of the years until now. Of course, fingers firmly crossed.
This is now four great harvests in a year in a row, and we are ready with the supply that we're gonna need of quality wine grapes to produce more than enough quality wine to meet the increasing demand for the next year and beyond that. As a market leader, we have many, many firsts to our credit. Now, for the first time, we're pleased to announce that we are launching three of our iconic Sula Vineyards brands in 250 ml cans for the first time. These are our Sula Chenin Blanc, that is India's number one selling white wine.... Our Rosé Zin , which is India's number one selling rosé, and our Red Zin, that's short for Zinfandel, cans. We have already launched these in Maharashtra. You will be seeing more noise on this, and we'll be launching it in other states down the road.
Canned wine is becoming a widely popular format the world over due to sheer convenience, and we do believe that our Sula brands in cans are gonna make their presence felt in the Indian market and greatly expand accessibility to new audiences and new consumers. In conclusion, while this quarter was a bit muted in terms of top-line growth, we are positive that in the upcoming quarters, we're gonna return to our double-digit growth trend. I will close out on that note. Over to you, Abhishek Kapoor, our CFO.
Thanks, Rajeev. A very good afternoon to everyone. As Rajeev has given a detailed narrative of our business performance, including key initiatives taken during the quarter, let me take you through the key highlights of our financial performance for the quarter. Our revenue from operations grew at 4%, net of excise at 6.5% growth for the quarter. Elite and premium portfolio grew at 7.3%, taking the elite and premium value contribution to 77%, which is 250 basis points up versus Q3 last year. Overall, volume growth for the quarter has been 4.6%. Our wine tourism business grew at strong 16% in quarter three, taking the nine-month growth to 18%. This double-digit growth is now for the fourth quarter in a row.
The record-breaking number of visitors and revenues are a testimony to the significant consumer traction which our wine tourism facilities are growing. As a result of a favorable mix change in revenues, our gross margin has expanded by 490 basis points to reach 67%. We continue to invest in our markets, focused on driving a healthy portfolio mix. We registered an EBITDA growth of 13%, with an EBITDA margin of 33.7%, up 260 basis points over Q3 last year. Our profit after tax for nine months, FY 2024, stands at 79.8 growth, up 14.3% YOY, and our EPS for nine months stands at 9-
Sorry, just repeat your last-
Okay. Sorry, I'll just repeat. Our profit after tax for nine months, FY 2024, stands at INR 79.8 growth, up 14.3% YOY, and our EPS for nine months stands at INR 9.45 per share, up 11%. Company's board has declared an interim dividend of INR 4 per share. We continue to remain strong on our net debt position, with debt to EBITDA at 1.3x. As Rajeev said, we remain positive for coming quarters to bounce back to our normal double-digit growth trajectory. With this, I request Runjhun to take over.
Yeah. Thank you, Abhishek. Rico, we can open the call for Q&A.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on the touch-tone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Aditya Soman from CLSA. Please go ahead.
Hi, good afternoon. So two questions. Firstly, can you explain why we needed to spend the higher S&D spends in Maharashtra in the quarter, and how much this increased sequentially, if I were to compare it with Q3? And second question, just an update on the status of the WIPS subsidy and the potential implications of that on the business going forward, as and when that is renewed. Thanks.
Yeah, on your first question, we did have to up our spend a bit to match up to some of our competitors' spends. Having said that, what we noticed immediately when we did that was we did take market share, and now really the spends have reached a level where we can only see them really coming down after this. We also... There was one change that we, that the market wanted from us, which was that in our, a lot of our schemes, we were giving a cash discount, and the rest of the companies have been giving the discount in kind. That is, if you buy, say, you buy 100 bottles and you get 40 bottles free, rather than saying you get, you know, 40% cash discount....
We had been resisting that for some time, but, unfortunately, given the market conditions, we have had to go back to that. So there is a little bit of a, you know, a transition period. Q3 has borne the brunt of that, but, moving forward, that will be the norm on that. In terms of the WIPS, I think everybody here has probably noted the CMO tweet. Unfortunately, we don't have much more visibility right now. What I would like to say is at least that tweet has removed people's, you know, doubts about whether this scheme would be revived or renewed. So definitely we can say that, yes, it's been revived. We have been waiting for a Maharashtra cabinet meeting to take place. It has been inordinately delayed.
In fact, today there is a cabinet meeting take place, taking place. The last cabinet meeting was 40 days ago. Normally, the minutes would have been approved in the next cabinet meeting of the fine print of the scheme, revival. So we are extremely confident that either in this cabinet meeting or maybe in the next, but hopefully in this one itself, the minutes should be forthcoming, and we should know the fine print. However, noting that even the CMO has tweeted, we do believe that, yes, the scheme is about to be revived imminently, and we are also very positive that the revival will include the full payment of past dues as well. So I, fingers crossed on that. Very optimistic on that. That's what we have to report.
No, I understand very clear. And just on the first point that you made about sort of discounts in kind, what would be the implications of that? And in a sense, why were you resisting that earlier?
We were unsure about the whole matter of the VAT on the free issues, given the WIPS thing was still hanging fire. Once we have reached, I think, a conclusion that it looks like the VAT refund is going to continue, then that gave us some more visibility as to what it meant to give these SME in kind. It's so it's a little complicated. That's about what I can tell you right now. But the way we have it planned out, it will not have the kind of implications in forward-going quarters as it did have in Q3.
No, I understand very clear. Thanks for that.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Vinamra Rawal from JM Financial. Please go ahead.
Hi, am I audible?
Yes.
Hi, Rajeev. Great to hear that we're looking at a fourth excellent harvest. So my question is, you know, as states other than Maharashtra, like Telangana, are growing faster, what is the impact on the pricing power we have in these states? Because they don't have free pricing for alcohol like Maharashtra does. And, are we still committed to increase prices by at least of elite and premium by around 3%-5% a year?
So obviously, in states where the pricing is restricted, that's not so easy for us. We would love to, but that is it sort of doesn't... It fits and starts. So a state like Telangana won't give you any price increase for three to four years, and then it'll give you, you know, a 10% price increase after four or five years. So, you know, I don't have, unfortunately, we don't have the power there. I would say that when you talk about 3%-5%, really what we're talking about is that in the free pricing states of Maharashtra and Karnataka, it's 4%-5%.
But given that those are, you know, 60% of our revenue, the other states, we expect lower average increases of more like maybe 2% a year, which, you know, is basically like a 10% increase every four years. That's the way it plays out, and so that's the way it works. So generally, we get lower pricing growth in the controlled pricing states than in the free pricing states. We do have certain other levers in terms of, you know, blends and the wines then that we push, which are the higher profit wines in those states. But we don't have a great, you know, leverage in terms of pricing in a state like Telangana or Haryana, for instance.
Got it. That was my only question. Thank you.
Thank you. Before we take the next question, a reminder to all participants, you may press star and one to ask a question. Our next question is from the line of Aman Sonthalia from AK Securities. Please go ahead. Mr. Aman Kumar, your line has been unmuted. Please go ahead with your question.
Yes, sir. So what is the current size of this wine market in India?
Sorry, I didn't get that.
What is the current size of wine market in India?
Current size of the wine market is just look at the Technopak details on that. You know, it's around 1% of the overall alcobev market, is what we are seeing.
How much growth we are anticipating in the next five years as far as wine is concerned, overall industry?
... No, five years is a very long time horizon, so I would hesitate to, to put a number on that. But I would say that we are looking at it. This is, you know, India is possibly going to be one of the top three or four wine growth markets in the world over the next five, five years. That's the way that I would put it. And I continue to believe that wine is going to outgrow spirits and beer. There will be quarter to quarter variation, no doubt, but we are going to talk about a, a year to year kind of thing, a full year to full year kind of thing. That's my anticipation. So I hope that gives color to the answer.
Sir, are we planning to set up another vineyard anywhere other than Nashik and just Bengaluru?
Yeah, we are continuously looking at that. I don't have any news on that right now, but it might not be in the too far future when we announce a third state. So we're always looking at policies. You know, policy is in flux, but there are a number of states which are coming out with fruit wine-friendly policies. And, you know, there are a couple of interesting options which we are considering, but nothing to announce right now.
One last question, sir: How much rent, VAT refund we are supposed to get?
The debt is around now INR 146 crore.
Okay, sir. Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, you may press star and one to ask a question. The next question is from the line of Jay Doshi from Kotak. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Yeah, yes. Hi, team. Thanks for the opportunity. I have two questions. The first one is, you know, you mentioned about a good harvest for fourth consecutive year. So does it have any financial implications? Because I was-- I believe your contracts are anyway fixed, right, in terms of pricing. So but, good quality or good harvest would mean you would have slightly better quality wine. But does it really translate into better realizations or anyway in terms of financial benefit when we think about next year?
Look, the main benefit is that we get to meet whatever is the demand for any brand, we have the supply to meet it. Apart from that, you know, there's no great benefit. But, you know, I think as a wine company, we are very conscious that around the world, in wine regions, you have, you know, ups and downs. You know, British Columbia, for instance, announced about a week back that this year they have lost 90% of their crop. So, you know, the implication is basically that we, whatever is the sales demand, we will be able to meet that. We will not be caught short, which is a good thing, but not anything else in terms of the really...
Nothing significant in terms of how much it's going to end up costing us in terms of quality, et cetera.
Understood. Second question is, you know, you did mention about this change in, you know, a slightly higher sales and distributions expenses, or change in that format impacting revenue growth. You know, when you look at gross margins, your gross margins, you know, there's a quarterly seasonality, so on a September, December cannot be compared with September. But when you look at December versus December last year, it's still expanding. My assumption is if your S&D expenses have gone up, and it is netted off from revenues as for Maharashtra market, then there should have been some impact on gross margins as well, which you're not able to see.
So in short, I mean, if you were to think about next year, and if this is the new normal of S&D spends, can you call out, if at all, there will be any impact on your gross margin, EBITDA margin, given that this is the largest and the most profitable market for you?
It's difficult to predict that. I would say that, Mumbai has been soft in Q3, and so sales were not as expected. And then that does impact when you have, a higher S&D. You know, you're hoping that that's going to translate to higher sales of your premium and elite. But the softness in Mumbai has definitely impacted. Pune, though, is seeing some strong, Pune and rest of Maharashtra are seeing some, strong growth. And Mumbai, South Bombay in particular, has been a, a stagnant market since the past, one or, or, two years. It has by far the highest per capita wine consumption in the country, but we are seeing some stagnancy in terms of, and in terms of general F&B revenues as well. So that would impact.
But as we get back to growth, then you should see a bounce in the net revenue. The S&D will not be, will not, you know, hit as meaningfully. That's what we are hoping for. Because the most of the S&D growth we're getting on the higher end wines. But in terms of visibility on gross margin, I'm sorry, right now, I don't have much visibility.
Understood. But is, was this a one-quarter phenomenon, or is this something that's a new normal, given that now that you have visibility on VAT refund, would this be a continuing thing, or was this only a one-quarter related, let's say, additional offer schemes, whatever you rolled out?
I think the time has come for us to scale back a bit. So, you know, I think we would see S&D as a percentage of sales in Maharashtra, possibly scale back a bit in the quarters to come.
Scale up, right? Or scale down.
Scale down. Scale down.
Versus this quarter. Understood. Thank you so much.
Yeah.
Thank you.
This quarter, we see Q3 as being the peak.
Understood. All right. Thank you so much, Rajeev, and good luck.
... Thank you. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Amruta Deherkar Sane from Wealth Managers (India) Private Limited. Please go ahead.
Hello. Yeah, thank you for this opportunity. So I have some, like, bookkeeping questions. So in terms of capacity, we have around 16.7 billion liters of capacity. Am I right? Hello?
Yes, that's correct.
Yeah.
Sorry, this is our COO, Karan Vasani, who's replying to you on this.
Okay.
Yeah. Please go ahead.
So in FY 2023, we had, like, around 10.6 lakh cases, right? So that could be around 9.5 billion liters of wine. So it actually works out to around 57% utilization. But whereas in the previous quarter's call, you had mentioned that the company is operating at around 85% of utilization. So, like, how do we actually calculate utilization?
Understood. Good question. Just to add, you know, when we are talking about utilization, we're talking about the entire quantum of wine that we sell in the... We are always making about 20%-25% more wine at an aggregate level than the amount of wine we sell in any particular year. This is to ensure that we are protected from any future climate shocks. So the utilization is actually based on the number of liters in tank, which is always higher than the amount of wine sold.
Okay. Okay. So they're two different numbers, okay.
Yes.
Second question is, like, regarding, like, I would like to understand more about the working capital cycle. So, which is the peak quarter for the inventory, as in, for the company, as in the raw material and the final inventory also?
Yeah. So, this is Abhishek. I'll answer this question. The peak for us is after the harvest, that's the buying season, which is there for us. So typically, Q4 and in Q1 is basically the quarters where it is highest, and it tapers down in Q2 and Q3. In terms of-
Financial year, right? Or calendar year, which you're talking about?
We are talking about the financial year.
Okay. Okay. Please go ahead. Hello?
You have a following question?
Hello. Yeah, could you please repeat the last part of the answer, please? Q4 and Q1 is the peak quarter. Am I right?
Yes.
Okay. And, like, what would be the grape to wine ratio that you have again?
May I request you to use your handset, please? Your audio is not very clear.
I'm actually using my handset. Hello? Hello? I'll get back in the queue. Thank you.
Yes, ma'am. Thank you
. Our next question is from the line of Riya Oberoi, who's an investor. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good afternoon. So my question is, your hospitality growth has been high compared to overall revenue. Are you expecting this trend to continue?
For Q4, yes, it's likely that hospitality, do you mean hospitality? Yes, it's likely that hospitality growth is significantly in excess of the overall level.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Amrish Kacker, who is an investor. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the opportunity. I was hoping you could help me understand the volume growth. So this quarter, we've had a total volume growth of 4.6%, but the elite and premium has been less than that, at 3.5, which means our popular and economy has grown more than, more than the elite and premium. Is that correct? And, and why would this be happening? Because last year it wasn't the case.
So the elite and premium has grown at 3.5%. Your numbers are correct. However, on a value basis, which is really how we're tracking our premiumization, the share of elite and premium continues to go up, and this would have something to do with the market mix and how the market mix is changing. Hence, you would see in, the volumes, while economy and popular has actually grown higher at 6%, but the value contribution overall has come down.
Yeah, yeah, sure. I think the error is clear in the numbers. I was just trying to understand, do we expect economy and popular to grow in volume terms more than elite and premium?
No, we don't expect that.
Okay.
I think that that has been an, that's been an aberration in Q3, and we fully expect that in Q4 we're going to get back to where we were earlier. We do expect in Q4 elite and premium to grow higher in volume significantly higher than popular and economy. That's just an aberration in this quarter.
Okay, cool. Thank you very much. All the best.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Shyam Gaur from Ladderup Finance Limited. Please go ahead. Mr. Shyam, may we request you to unmute your line from your side and go ahead with the question?
I'm just putting in.
Mr. Shyam, sir, you're not audible. May I request you to use your handset, please?
Hello? Oh, actually,
... Sir, may I request that we move to the next participant, please? The next question is from the line of Tejkumar Pandya from BHEL. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thank you. My first question is that your revenue, I'm told that you import wines also, and that is a part of your business. Now, how much percentage of this business is for the import of these wines? To what extent, out of, say, your total turnover is about INR 27 for this quarter, how much is it contributes to wines being imported?
Four percent.
Oh, 4%.
It's around 4% is the imported wine. So we are very much, very much now about own brand. So I see here that, out of INR 217 crore or so, just INR 9 crore or so was imported brands. Is that right, James?
Yes. Yeah.
Are you able to make a profit out of those imported wines or you just-
I must, I must say that our own brand business is much more profitable than the imported brand business, and that is one of the big reasons why our imported brand reason has, in fact, imported brand business has declined. The year ago quarter, we were closer to INR 15 crore. This year, we are closer to INR 9 crore. And so we have been hiving off the most unprofitable part of the business one by one, and now we've come down to a much smaller rump of this business, which is decently profitable, but not anything close to our own brands.
Okay, one last question. So you, do you export wines also? Is that a profitable business? Are you exporting any of your wines?
Yeah. Export is something like 2 or 3% of our overall, production, of our overall sale of our own brands. 97% is in India. Our export is only 2 or 3%. And again, that is not as profitable for us as selling our wines, in India. This export is basically of our premium and elite wines, and if you look at the premium and elite wines' profitability in India, it's, it's far higher. However, having said that, it is important for us as a, a wine company becoming more and more globally recognized, that our wines should be available in major markets around the world, and so we do do that. But, it's a highly competitive market, and so selling domestically is more profitable.
Yeah, naturally, because I have heard recently there was an overproduction of French wines, and they had to destroy those wines. Is that information correct information?
Yes, but I think let's move on to one more question. Yes, that is correct information. There has been... There is some oversupply in certain markets of, by, in certain countries. Yes.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you, sir, so much.
Not really destroy the wine, but they had to distill it into a spirit.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Aman Kumar Sonthalia from AK Securities. Please go ahead.
Sir, recently you have launched this can wine. So how big is the market and how much profitability?
So the market worldwide is looking very exciting. It's now a multi-billion-dollar market, which has been growing much stronger than wine in bottles in the rest of the world. In India, it's a very tiny market. It's just begun. You know, we are the pioneers of this. There's us and one more company really doing it. But you know, it's very early days. It's the launch of a whole new category, and we hope that it's going to grow into a decent market in times to come. But it's something that's the need of the moment. You know, Indians, Indian households tend to have smaller fridges. They don't have any... Very few have, you know, wine chillers, et cetera, et cetera.
So there's not always that much place in the fridge to put big bottles of, you know, 750 ml bottles of wine, et cetera. Then you have the, you know, just the portability and the sustainability angle of it. So given all of those, wine in a can is very exciting for the future. But right now, it's a tiny market. We are the ones who plan to grow this market.
Sir, the next question is, we are looking for the tier-two market, tier-two cities. So how much success we are getting and how big is this market?
Good question, sir. Karan here. Tier two markets are now starting to grow quite rapidly. I think in the, so far, wine has been confined to the bigger cities, but in our previous earnings call also, we were mentioning that markets now like Punjab and Uttar Pradesh are starting to grow very rapidly. And we are seeing that trend continue, and these are the markets that will drive the growth in the future.
Sir, one more question. When we will account for this wine, the VAT incentive, in which quarter?
Sorry, sir, could you repeat the question?
VAT refund, incentive, when we will account for, in which quarter?
That is already being accounted for each quarter on an ongoing basis.
Okay. And sir, which is the peak quarter for the company?
The third quarter is the highest quarter in terms of revenue on a quarterly basis.
Okay. And then the Q4?
Yes.
Okay, sir. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today. I now hand the conference over to the management for closing comments.
Thanks, everyone, for participating today, and thank you for all the questions. We look forward to a nice double-digit bounce back in Q4. And, with that in mind, we now call this to an end.
Thank you. On behalf of Sula Vineyards Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.