THE chicken kings, Jack and Bob Ingham, have beaten out a multinational with a chicken deal in New Zealand.

The Ingham brothers' private chicken company, Inghams Enterprises, has edged out H J Heinz's Tegel chicken subsidiary in supplying the shaky isles' KFC, Pizza Hut and Starbucks chains.

The deal is worth about $NZ35 million ($31.8 million) a year, a mere speck on the landscape for the Inghams' $1.12 billion a year empire.  It is the second foray into NZ, Inghams having bought Harvey Farms in 1990.

NZ company Restaurant Brands Ltd, which has the New Zealand franchise for KFC, Pizza Hut and Starbucks outlets, said it will change chicken supplier in 2004, cutting its costs for the meat by about 12 per cent, Bloomberg reported yesterday.

Auckland's Restaurant Brands will buy its chicken from Inghams when its contract with the Tegel division of HJ Heinz ends in June 2004.

Changing supplier will cut its chicken costs by about $NZ5 million to $NZ35 million a year, Restaurant Brands CEO Jim Collier said in a statement.

"Inghams' bid was considerably more attractive to Restaurant Brands," Mr Collier said.

The company's operating costs have been about 92 per cent of annual sales in the past four years.

Last week, Restaurant Brands, which operates KFC and Pizza Hut outlets under a franchise agreement with Yum! Brands, said third-quarter sales rose 10 per cent to $NZ68.9 million.  KFC sales fell 4.4 per cent to $NZ40 million.

Yum! Brands is a US company based in Kentucky.  It operates KFC, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, Long John Silvers and A & W worldwide.

Extract from Sydney Daily Telegraph 17/12/02