Economic growth and increasing investment in construction have facilitated sales of paint this year.

Thas Chantrea, sales manager of Jotun Cambodia, said his company’s sales of paint products from Thailand and Malaysia saw an increase of 50 per cent in the first quarter of this year compared to the same period last year. He added that recent

the government enforcement of a new customs regime had not significantly affected the prices of the company’s products, but imports were slightly slower.

“Our sales are increasing because the company has been advertising nationwide and branches of our stores are opening around the country,” he said. “Competition in the Cambodian market is heating up, but our products still have a place in the market, because we have a policy of building trust with our customers,” he said.

Government taxation on imports was not affecting his company, said Chantrea, who added that it was a necessary move by the government because there so were a large number of tax-exempt companies in Cambodia, requiring changes even if the result was an increase in prices.

Horng Vanna, who owns a construction materials store on Mao Tse Toung Boulevard, said that sales of paint products in her store were better this year than in 2013 due to growth in investment in the construction sector.

Among the paint brand names that were selling well was U90 Emulsion Paint, since its quality was as good as imported brands, Vanna said.

“U90 is a locally manufactured product made from imported raw products,” she said, adding that it sells well because it has been on the Cambodian market for many years and is well known.

However, DULUX sales manager Tang Lyheang said that recently imposed duties had seen sales plummet by as much as 50 per cent so far this year compared to last year. The price of DULUX had increased to $5 per bucket since the government enforced the new taxes, he said.

According to Lyheang, DULUX sold between 3,000 and 5,000 buckets per month in Phnom Penh, but the company also delivers directly for provincial orders.

Heng Tech, a translator at Ka Hing Cambodia Investment, which makes a variety of paint products from its location in Boeung Salang, Phnom Penh, said the company’s business was not going as well as it had last year, adding that the firm’s products were not very well known despite the fact that it had been manufacturing them since 2010.

“The reason that clients do not know our products so well is that we do not sell them on the market. Our staff find clients in the construction field, and we make the products according to their requirements,” he said.