Inside UBL’s Diageo One Business To Business App And How It Works

By Our Reporter

On Friday; Uganda Breweries Ltd launched the Diageo One mobile app to connect their distributors to retailers to ease doing business and save time of having to travel physically to a distributor to make orders.

Speaking at the launch at Kampala Serena Hotel, Andrew Kilonzo the Managing Director of Uganda Breweries Ltd (UBL) said that the application will go a long way to ease the process of doing business between the company and their clientele.

He also said that with the app, the company is looking to facilitate innovations that will help them become more effective and efficient; efficiency in that consumers can be able to access UBL products.

When asked to explain in detail what Diageo One entails, Kilonzo had this to say: “This is a self service business to business portal that will enable customers but Uganda Breweries products directly from our distributors.” He further said that retailers will be able to run their outlets off the Diageo One portal because all the products of the company will be available.

The app is available on both the IOS and android system and it is easy to interface with to ensure convenience.

Speaking to journalists on the sideline of the launch, Ben Mbuvi the Sales Director at UBL said that the unique thing with the app is that the prices of all their products will be the same hence eliminating middlemen who hike prices of certain products to make profits.

Mbuvi further said that the application has all the safety nets like a strong firewall which can detect hackers at both the global and local level. Furthermore he said that identification of the distributor outlets is done by the company, so the chance of fraudsters using the system is null and void.

The Pilot project was done by one distributor called Justima, and during the two month period, the distributor was able to serve over 500 customers, and also 300 people signed up on the app.

When asked whether the app was not launched in Uganda as a knee jerk reaction following the unveiling of a similar app by one of their competitors; Nile Breweries Limited Mbuvi had this to say: “Diageo One is not a UBL platform, it is a Diageo platform. Kenya went live two years ago, and I don’t think there was African company in the adult beverage industry that was on DIAGEO ONE. It was celebrated globally as a first of its kind in the world.”

He clarified that launching the app in Uganda doesn’t mean that it has not been in operation before because on the African market, Kenya was first, followed by Ghana, and Uganda is now the third market. He said that more markets are being researched on so that they get on board.

He concluded that Diageo One hopes to achieve two things i.e. giving their customers better customer service, and use the platform to design promotions that suit the consumer needs with the data that goes on the system.

A customer who orders using the app will be able to receive their orders within a 24 hour period, and they will earn points for every order that they make, which points can be converted into prizes like getting a complete makeover of a customer’s bar or outlet done by UBL.