Softa Bottling Company was deregistered on Friday marking an end to a bold entity that chose to compete with multi-nationals like Coca-Cola company.
The company is now dissolved.
“It is notified that at the expiry of three months from the date of this gazette, the names of the undermentioned companies shall, unless cause is shown to the contrary, be struck off the register of companies and the company shall be dissolved,” the notice in the Kenya Gazette on Friday read in part as reported by Daily Nation.
According to Softa Bottling Company founder Peter Kuguru, the closure is as a result of poor returns from the soft drinks maker. He, however, said that he will shift his investment to a niche with attractive returns.
“We have been in many businesses, some succeed and others fail. But we never give up and when a business is not making the returns as required, you can always invest elsewhere. My spirit is not dampened,” Kuguru said in an interview with Daily Nation.
The Softa founder traces his company's woes back to 2007 when the political environment did not favour operations.
In a 2016 interview with Business Daily, he partly blamed politics for the downfall of the Kenyan entity.
Another reason for shutting down is the inability to get a joint venture partner.
"In the 2007/2008 post-election violence everything changed and our business faced a lot of wrath from political activists. After that the government which took over started removing our containers from the roadside. So we lost a lot of the marketing channels which we had built. It became a struggle," Kuguru explained to Business Daily.