Zesta promotes innovation through partnership with AOD

• Sunshine Holdings’ group company, Watawala Tea Ceylon, engages with Academy of Design students to develop new tea packaging    

Watawala Tea Ceylon (WTC) has extended an opportunity for students of the Academy of Design (AOD) to enhance their creative skills by engaging them to develop a new packaging design solution for the company’s Zesta brand.

WTC is a member of diversified conglomerate Sunshine Holdings Plc.

Under this unique partnership, WTC intends to challenge and incentivise the young third-year students of AOD to come up with innovative results and develop breakthrough pack design solutions for Zesta. The company will support the students in this process and then reward their solution if it is exceptional. 

As part of this joint project, the AOD students received exposure to state-of-the-art processes and methodologies of the country’s top branded tea company and its procedure for delivering a high quality product. 

“Partnership between corporates and academic institutions can be mutually beneficial; foster innovation and provide substantial support to students in their professional development,” Watawala Tea Ceylon CEO Visal Wickramarathne said. 

“Watawala Tea Ceylon therefore takes great pleasure in this partnership and looks forward to several such opportunities to contribute to the professional development of youth. This partnership further reflects our constant emphasis on innovation in all aspects of operations.”     

Watawala Tea Ceylon Ltd., a joint venture between Sunshine Holdings Plc, TATA Global Beverages and Pyramid Wilmar Plantations Ltd., markets three distinct brands of Tea: Zesta, Watawala Tea and Ran Kahata. The largest branded tea company in the country in terms of consumer preference at present, Watawala Tea Ceylon also operates gift tea boutiques and is also involved in tea exports, earning much-needed foreign revenue for the country. Apart from tea, the company also markets its own brands of bottled water and edible oil.