Alpine Drinks Ltd: Questions around liquidation of Hawke’s Bay water bottling company to be answered

Some of the mystery surrounding the collapse of Hawke’s Bay water-bottling and flavoured drinks operation Alpine Drinks, which closed owing creditors almost $2.6 million, is expected to be uncovered in a liquidation report this week.

The imminent release of the second report was confirmed by Simon Dalton, who was appointed after the liquidation was ordered in the High Court on July 2 last year, shutting down the business situated on the former Louie Wood and Sons woolscorers site on the seaward side of State Highway 51, Awatoto.

In the first report a month later, Dalton, of Auckland insolvency specialists Gerry Rea Partners, reported liabilities of $246,581 to secured creditors and that unsecured creditors were owed $2,437,334.

The Awatoto site still carries the branding of Alpine Drinks, which stopped trading last July and was placed in liquidation owing creditors almost $2.6 million. Photo / Doug Laing.

He had identified more than 50 creditors, including family of director and Auckland businessman Arajan Odedra and associated companies, and said the director had advised he had the support of third-party investors in the hope of raising funds to reimburse creditors and bring the company out of liquidation.

He said if the company was not brought out of liquidation he would conduct an investigation into its failure, but at the time it was not practical to estimate the date of completion of the liquidation.

Alpine Drinks NZ Ltd established the operation in 2018, to utilise a resource consent for the taking of 1.179 million cubic metres of water a year, issued five years earlier, part of the wider picture of consents issued in Hawke’s Bay.

In 2019 Odedra revealed a plan to produce flavoured drinks, saying it would be health and upper-end product but, according to one report, “not foreigners coming in and taking all the water”.

Odedra was responsible for governance of operations and production facilities, including the plant equipment, quality control, and continuous process improvement within Alpine Drinks, the company website says.

It described Alpine Drinks as a 100% “Kiwi owned” company, started with the aim of creating a world-class, Kiwi-owned, beverage business.

It describes Odedra as a former student at Auckland’s Massey High School and Auckland University, with 35 years in the electrical and refrigeration industry.

He is currently listed as director and shareholder of Auckland company Able Appliances Ltd, but Hawke’s Bay Today’s attempts to contact him through that company’s landline number and two of its email addresses indicated they are no longer in use.

The Awatoto building, owned by Craig and Robyn Bryant, of Taupo, was put on the market last year and tenders closed in December. It was described as a large vacant warehouse building on 7616sq m of industrial land.

It neighbours the Awatoto plant of One Pure, an owner of which was reported in 2023 as also being pursued over a claimed multi-million debt in China.

Doug Laing is a senior reporter based in Napier with Hawke’s Bay Today, and has 51 years of journalism experience, 41 of them in Hawke’s Bay, in news gathering, including breaking news, sports, local events, issues, and personalities.