Guinness

In 2024, Singapore's Tolaram Group bought Diageo's majority stake in Guinness Nigeria, a deal that has since grown Tolaram's holding to 70.86%, while new long-term license and royalty agreements keep Guinness Stout, Smirnoff, Johnnie Walker, and Baileys flowing under the same familiar labels. What changed was who calls the shots day to day, and by every measure since, it has mattered: also switching its financial year-end from June to December, over the resulting extended 18-month reporting period revenue came in at ₦730.8 billion, up 144%, gross profit rose 152% to ₦230.5 billion, operating profit jumped 251% to ₦89.3 billion, and the company turned a ₦54.7 billion loss into a ₦41.2 billion profit, one of the sharper corporate turnarounds in Nigeria's consumer sector in years.

MD Girish Sharma has attributed the recovery to wider distribution reach, tighter production costs, and faster decision-making now that they no longer travel through a global corporate structure, built around culture, operational excellence, staying close to the consumer, and financial discipline. Tolaram's deep local distribution knowledge, honed through Indomie, has been credited with helping accelerate the shift.

Momentum has carried into the new financial year, with Q1 FY2026 profit after tax up from ₦7.03 billion to ₦10.39 billion and finance costs cut sharply from ₦7.72 billion to ₦1.43 billion. By Q2, half-year revenue had reached roughly ₦265 billion with profit after tax up 53% to ₦25.3 billion, and the board declared an additional interim dividend, though Sharma has cautioned that 2025's extraordinary pace of rebound won't repeat indefinitely and that double-digit growth is the more realistic expectation going forward. Guinness Nigeria enters 2026 seventy-five years into its life in the country, with a new owner, a new fiscal calendar, and a set of results strong enough to suggest the harder years are behind it.