Champion Breweries Plc, on Friday reported a 70% rise in profit for the first quarter of 2018 to ₦67 million. In the same period last year, the company recorded ₦39.5 in profit.

The brewer best known for its Champion Lager and Champ malta drink was helped by a 2% growth in revenue to ₦1.1 billion and a 9.4% reduction in cost of sales. But the biggest impact to net profit came from increased selling and distribution expense which rose by 55.23% to ₦121 million.

Champion Breweries is a subsidiary of Heineken N.V. through Raysun Nigeria Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Dutch brewer.