September magazine

September 2012 www.endeavourmagazine.com

LESEGO PLATINUM

ARUP

STANDARD ELECTRICAL

UK £4.95 CAN $14.75 USA $7.99 EUR €7.90 SA ZAR 58.00

Inspired by your success

Having Fun is Serious Business!

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‘J1_blackbkgd_500px.png’ on a black J1 invites you to experience F1 from the inside background. like never before!

NOTE this logo file includes an extra Featuring Eddie Jordan & The J1 Club,black it is white stroke so it stands outRace against custom designed for your exact corporate hospitality needs. Get in touch with J1-RPMC for unique worldwide F1 excitement, travel and events.

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September 2012 www.endeavourmagazine.com

LESEGO PLATINUM

Editor’s note

ARUP

By Daemon Sands

STANDARD ELECTRICAL

Chief Editor of Endeavour Magazine UK £4.95 CAN $14.75 USA $7.99 EUR €7.90 SA ZAR 58.00

Inspired by your success

Heads of Departments Editor in Chief Daemon Sands daemonsands@littlegatepublishing.com Director of Research Don Campbell doncampbell@littlegatepublishing.com Sales Director James Martin james.martin@littlegatepublishing.com Corporate Director Anthony Letchumaman anthonyl@littlegatepublishing.com Lead Designer Alina Sandu studio@littlegatepublishing.com Publisher: Stephen Warman stevewarman@littlegatepublishing.com Any enquiries or subscriptions can be sent to info@littlegatepublishing.com ENDEAVOUR MAGAZINE is published by Littlegate Publishing LTD which is a Registered Company in the United Kingdom.

Company Registration: 07657236 Registered office: 343 City Road London EC1 V1LR VAT registration number:116 776007 Littlegate Publishing Ltd The Glasshouse, Kings Lane Norwich, NR1 3PS United Kingdom

One of the things we have always prided ourselves in at Littlegate Publishing is our approach to business. You have to have a sense of humour to do business, especially in today’s market where every good idea has to squeeze through a gauntlet of competition and naysayers desperate to slow you down so they can keep up. If you want to prosper then an appreciation of wit and a cultivated taste for irony are two things you had better develop.

A great example of this is the Apple and Samsung battle both suing each other for copyright infringement. In South Korea where new technology is a desperately needed and difficult to get hold of, a judge decided that the only way to sort out this argument between these two technological giants was to ban them both from selling their products in their country. So as ridiculous as it might sound you may not be able to buy Samsung or Apple products within an Asian country. Unless of course you count North Korea, but I don’t think they would.

Another fantastic case of irony which almost hurts is a recent story I heard of a tyrant business owner with a reputation for not paying staff, backstabbing investors and laughing in the faces of underlings while draining the company funds to fund his lavish lifestyle. After then exhausting all possibilities to raise funds he goes cap in hand to those same staff, investors and underlings to buy his business so that he doesn’t go to jail or end up in a cardboard box.

Businesses should be looked at as ships, vessels to carry a necessary crew with a captain always looking to the future and the next opportunity.

A ship can be fixed to carry almost any cargo and crew can always be retrained but as long as they are looked after by the captain they will remain loyal and diligent to their roles and will work well whether they’re moving cattle, crops or post.

Understanding this we have scoured through the highest echelons of business leadership to bring you the finest calibre of success stories. You’ll find, as per usual, that the humour is of the finest crop available, the design is the crispest and freshest and our style is as always engaging and simply delightful.

Littlegate Publishing Ltd does not accept responsibility for omissions or errors. The points of view expressed in articles by attributing writers and/or in advertisements included in this magazine do not necessarily represent those of the publisher.

Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental. Whilst every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of the information contained within this magazine, no legal responsibility will be accepted by the publishers for loss arising from use of information published. All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced or stored in a retrievable system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher.

Copyright © Littlegate Publishing Ltd 2012

We understand business because we are inspired by your success.

Kindest,

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

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Features

16 Eqstra Fleet Management: Driving Ahead 22 Origin Wine: Through The Grapevine 28 Red Crest Farms: Choice Of Taste For The Nation In Love With Chicken 34 Standard Electrical: Energise, Incentivise, Economise. 40 Circlevest: Homing In At The Cutting Edge 46 Black Balance Projects: Strong Philosophy Strong Foundation 50 Fairbrother Geotechnical Engineering: Knowing Where You Stand 54 Arup: Shaping A Better World 60 Lesego Platinum: Unearthing Value 66 Pro Roof Group: Hard As Steel 72 Thos Begbie: Bright New World 76 Concargo: 25 Years Of Knowing Your Market 80 Legacy Hotels: Building A Legacy

Interesting Facts of Business

By Joan Pumpkin

Historically accurate and the setting for the most awkward of family barbecues, in 1961 Tom and James Monaghan purchased a pizza restaurant for $500. After eight months of running the business as a partnership James decided to trade his stake of the business to his brother for a used Volkswagen Beetle‌ In 1998, Tom Monaghan decided it was time to retire from his pizza business and sold his 93% share of his company, known as Dominos for one billion dollars. Ouch. But pizza is yummy.

Articles

6 10 The Workshop 11 Of The World’s 12 Most Annoying Things If I Ruled 14 The World Sexpo: 86 How Refreshing

Olympic Alchemy Turning Olympic Gold Into Jobs

Gambling To Save The Company

By Gerald Washroot After raising nearly $90 million and contributing his own fortune of $4 million to the cause, Fred Smith successfully founded Federal Express in 1971. Unfortunately three years later thanks to rising fuel costs the company was on the verge of bankruptcy with no one willing to give them any more loans nor any investors interested in contributing capital. At one point all the company had was $5000 to its name, which wasn’t enough to continue operating as their planes needed fuel and that wouldn’t cover it. Not to be dissuaded, Smith took the $5000 and flew to Vegas and played Black Jack that weekend with the remaining company funds.

Zippers

By Monday the company has $32 000 in its bank

By Marcus Berundi account. Today they are still the most successful express company in the world. All because one Look down, does your zipper have YKK? It does, man took a chance.

I’m a genius… or I’m hiding under your desk. YKK actually stands for Yoshida Kogyo Kabushikikaisha.

Since 1934 YKK have been manufacturing the zippers for the world. Not only do they make over 9 million zippers every day, they also make the machines that make the zippers that operate in over 206 facilities in 52 countries. I always thought zippers were invented by a woman because no man would invent a strip of mechanical teeth so close to his… unmentionables.

Anyway, I’ve heard that Tadao Yoshida the man who founded the company caught himself in a zipper once and since then has always used buttons.

“Always forgive your enemies.

Nothing annoys them more.”

Oscar Wilde

OLYMPIC ALCHEMY

TURNING OLYMPIC GOLD INTO JOBS

by Daemon Sands Firstly, a bit of bragging: London is the first city to officially host the Olympic Games three times, having previously done so in 1908 and in 1948. The Games received widespread acclaim for their organisation, with the volunteers, the British military, and public enthusiasm praised particularly highly. The opening ceremony, directed by Danny Boyle, also received near-universal acclaim. During the Games, Michael Phelps became the most decorated Olympic athlete of all time, winning his 22nd medal. Great Britain achieved its highest tally of gold medals since 1908, finishing third in the medal table. Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Brunei entered female athletes for the very first time, meaning every country has sent a female competitor to at least one Olympic Games.

As seven billion people watched the Olympic and Paralympic Games, cheering on their countrymen and women in the most famous city in the world nobody was giving any thought to what was going on behind the scenes.

While we were marvelling at the far extreme of physical fitness on display we didn’t ask ourselves about what would follow. Luckily, some people were. Donnie Rust speaks about it with Deputy Mayor of Business and Enterprise, Kit Malthouse.

With women’s boxing included, the Games became the first at which every sport had female competitors.

As Deputy Mayor for Business and Enterprise, your role is far from a simple one but one of the most crucial to creating lasting economic development.

“Maximizing the number of economically active Londoners by creating employment is the task at hand,” Malthouse explains, “Our plan is to do this by encouraging start ups and regenerating businesses to stimulate growth in a number of sectors and increase the number of employed youths. After all a busy city is a happy one.”

There has been enormous change in London over the last decade, dramatic investments to infrastructure and commerce, more people from abroad coming to live and work in London and it is still the commercial crossroad of the world. All as the capital of Britain. The credit crunch

and the global recession had a significant toll on London but even so the city is okay. She has held her own, with the determination and resilience of the English bulldog she has pushed through and now employment is rising.

“Just not fast enough,” Kit explains, “That is where I come in.

“The grass roots of growth for any city or country starts with the job market. People have to be employed and with more young people hitting the marketplace in London, there are more jobs that need to be developed and the 2012 London Games and the 2012 Paralympics have provided us with a well needed push.”

Understanding that the games were not your sole focus what has the feeling been behind the scenes during the London 2012 Games on a management and personnel level?

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 7

“It was meticulously planned before we even won the bid.

I was involved with several different operations organizing police security, transportation and logistics,” Kit reveals, “One of the things that have stood out has been how smoothly everything went from start to finish and it was all down to the planning, like the saying goes ‘You plan the fight and then fight the plan’, “We also took the time to plan for contingencies for mishaps, game plans for tackling problems with quickly applicable solutions to keep the flow of people moving.”

The best solutions are often found in times of crisis or stress where failure is simply not an option and the Games provided a similar sort of proving ground for Kit’s department.

“We’ve been taught a lot by the games,” Kit admits, “With millions of people coming into London during this period we were pressed to make improvements to the efficiency of the city’s infrastructure and having done so we have applied these in the day to day operations of the city.”

Such developments have an outward ripple. The security enhancements that were used to ensure the athletes and spectators were safe at all times will continue being used for the general populace, the changes to the road systems will provide greater access to and from the city and transport improvements to the underground will mean easier commuting for London workers and residents.

Did the construction and infrastructure involved play a part in a long term plan for the London people?

“Absolutely! For us the construction of the Olympic venues was only a small part of the job, an important part obviously but a part nonetheless, and that is the genius of their architectural design. We were never going to find ourselves in the position after the Games of looking at them and thinking, ‘What now?’,” Kit says quite seriously, “The tax payer paid over nine billion pounds to produce these and now it’s the time for us to give back. Once the Paralympic Games have been completed, development of the venues begins to convert them for public and commercial use and development around the Olympic Park site will begin to build homes, lots of them family homes and develop the parklands.”

The five new developments will also extend central Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

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London eastwards, providing more jobs and uplifting communities.

“It might be the end of the Games but it’s not even half way for us, there is a long and busy time of development ahead.”

Construction creates jobs, a lot of them, it is the one industry that is far from being replaced by IT and there is a lot that goes into it recharging businesses across the board including those companies supplying raw materials, the contractors, the machine suppliers and logistics/ haulage.

An upward spiral will bring employment to thousands even hundreds of thousands.

With so many different cultures and people living within the city limits what initiatives are in place to maintain good social relations?

“Well it’s not our job to manage the social relationships of people,” Kit explains, “Instead we prefer to promote an air of tolerance for all. It was a testament to the people of London as much as us that the Olympians said that they felt nothing but welcomed and at home in the city. They said their experience of London was as a vibrant, tolerant city and acted as a breath of fresh air.”

After the Olympic Games and the Paralympic Summer Games what are the forthcoming plans for London?

Both Games have been brilliant adverts for the UK. Over recent years there hasn’t been bad publicity as such but as one of the major cities in the world a lot of media attention has come to London during the recession as a representative of all of Britain,” he says, “But this has been an opportunity for us to show the world what we’re capable of and we have to capitalize on the huge wave of goodwill to bring in investment and turn that into jobs.”

In conclusion London has a few things to be proud of. Not only the brilliant result of the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, but also the foundation of job creation that has been established because of them and it may be this that will outlast the impact of the Games themselves.

“The legacy of the 2012 London Games will be the rise of jobs in the city,” Kit Malthouse Deputy Mayor for Business and Enterprise.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

THE WORKSHOP

by Jim Blythe

Our recent restructure has led to the need to change a number of working practices. Well, I say it’s led to a need; what in fact has happened is that the new leaders of the organisation have decided that we need to do things differently because they know better than the old leaders.

New leaders always know better than old leaders in my experience. You often wonder how the old leaders managed to lead for so long given how little they knew compared to the new managers. But then, the older managers knew better then the managers that came before them, which is amazing considering how much that leadership team apparently seemed to know. The one commonality between all these increasingly all-knowing leaders is that they know outsourcing parts of the organisation to other organisations is the best thing in the world. The inevitable end point of all this is that we eventually have the equivalent of leadership superheroes running the organisation who know more than the rest of humanity combined. They will, presumably, be the leadership team that eventually outsource even themselves so that the organisation just disappears. Some might argue that’d be no great loss.

Anyway our current crop of hyper-intelligent and insightful leaders have called on us to change our processes, governance, products, roles and… oh, just everything that can possibly be changed, like a spurned lover decorating any trace of their ex out of their once shared property. This is excellent news if you’re a Programme Manager because they’re the people who get to make all this happen. Those who succeed will have rewards lavished upon them whilst those who fail will disappear, wiped not only from the future of the organisation but also, as far as can humanly be managed, from it’s past. Me and Phil have been given the task of working with Neil which is a shame as Neil is “ambitious”. Like a vacuous teenager who craves celebrity for its own sake, Neil craves promotion. I think he’ll get it because Neil apparently knows better than any leader we’ve ever had, ever, in the history of… ever. This is the man to outsource himself. And Neil has decided to kick off his programme by having a Workshop. Workshops are of course events where lots of people who know nothing come together to pool their ignorance.

I know nothing about the staff impacted and what the impacts will be which makes me perfectly placed to discuss our training strategy whist Phil has no idea how many staff are impacted and how so he’s well equipped for some organisational design work. Around the table is Ben who has no idea how IT will be impacted, if at all, Susan from Comms who has no idea what’s going on in general, never mind on this programme and Heather, one of the department managers who has no desire to change anything and is therefore the ideal person to help us change things.

Neil starts off by explaining that we need to put a strategy and a plan together which sound sensible enough, if a little predictable.

“A plan to do what?” asks Heather.

“To review our processes, governance, products and roles,” replies Neil, “Initially.” he adds.

“We don’t need to change any of those things.” says Heather, dismissively. “They’re fine.”

“We can’t be sure of that unless we review them though, can we!” says Neil, playing a trump card surprisingly early in the day. “So let’s start by getting what we know on flipcharts shall we?” he continues. This doesn’t take all that long.

Neil doesn’t know which particular processes, governance, products and roles we should, initially, be reviewing so plums for the wide-reaching brief “all of them.” Ben isn’t sure which systems will be affected by reviewing “all of them” but he thinks it’ll probably be most of them. But he has no idea what this will cost or how long it might take.

Susan is reluctant to start communicating anything as she doesn’t know what it is we’re communicating. And she’s not sure when we should start or what the strategy should be at this time. Phil is forced to conclude that working through the people impacts of this could be tricky under the circumstances but is happy to concede that there might be some. Possibly.

“And Jim, any thoughts on training?” Neil asks. He asks me last because people always ask about training last.

This is because every Programme Manager ever created (Programme Managers aren’t born) believes that training is the easy bit of the programme and that they know more about it than any L&D Professional ever.

“Nothing concrete at the moment Neil.” I reply. He raises his eyebrows to prompt something a little more.

“I can’t be sure what training will be required for who, how long it will last or what it will cost on the basis that I don’t know which systems are affected, who’s impacted, what the comms strategy is or even what we’re doing.” I tell him. Neil sighs, like a disappointed schoolteacher.

“I thought it was clear that what we’re doing is reviewing all of our processes, governance, products and roles.

Initially.” he tuts.

One day Neil and people like him will run our organisation.

And I will need to review what I want to do for a living.

Initially.

Jim Blythe is a writer, actor, director, producer, comedian and inconsiderate lover. When he isn’t moaning about his experiences in the field of business he runs Spooky Kid Productions, a platform to help new talent get in front of an audience. See more of what he does at www.spookykid.co.uk.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 11

11 OF THE WORLD’S MOST ANNOYING THINGS

by Donnie Rust As my fame continues to grow I am expecting to have people approaching me to sign autographs, books, CDs and baby’s foreheads so before there are any problems, hiccups or arguments I wanted to put forward a list of some of the things that annoy me. I suppose you could call this a public announcement.

1. Toilet paper that tears off in unusable strips: Disposable toilet paper that’s soft and just absorbent enough to do its job has to be one of the greatest inventions on the planet. While it is less of a brilliant idea and more of a natural necessity we have all experienced the exactly same thought processes as the man who invented it originally, when we’ve sat down on the throne and the world has fallen out of us and we’ve looked around to discover that we’re out of toilet paper. However there is nothing more annoying than when you have to open up a new roll and for some reason it unravels awkwardly so you end up tearing off giant heaps of the stuff just to get at one, perfect smooth sheet. It’s a bizarre commitment to perfection we all have giving what we’re planning on doing with it.

2. Packaging: About 0.0005% of films made today are even vaguely enjoyable and only the subliminal messaging hidden in the actual film advertising that makes us watch the film let alone buy the DVD. I have come to the conclusion that producers are in cahoots with the packaging companies to ensure that it’s so difficult to unpack the DVD that you get a greater sense of joy at finally getting the thing open compared to ever watching it. The only time this would work is if they were still selling adult orientated DVDs, which they’re not anymore.

3. Lottery emails that start with the word “CONGRATULATIONS”: I, like you, want to be a millionaire and while I’m working long and hard for it I’m not against the idea of taking the easy route and winning it all. In fact I’m quite up for the idea. So I am happy to spend my £8 a month to automatically be included in the lottery game. The money is taken out every month via Direct Debit and I play the same numbers every time. It’s nice, it’s convenient and I don’t have to feel like I’m gambling. Because, as I’m terrible at it, I have to admit I have a gambling problem. After every draw, between the hope of winning and the heartbreak of losing I get an email from the lottery company starting the

same way CONGRATULATIONS! I know it’s just congratulating me for being so smart as to purchase my tickets online but there is that brief, half a second where my heart stops and I picture myself in the Batmobile and once I actually air punched and told my boss to go away and procreate. Well, I kind of said that.

4. People who hum along with music they’re listening to on earphones: Oddly enough I don’t mind if it’s someone who are deliberately doing it because they believe they are actually in a music video about their life. In which case I’m quite happy to watch and join in on the chorus. But for people who like to hum quietly to themselves but want to hear themselves humming so they have to hum really loudly because they still want their music to be loud enough to drown out the exasperated sighs of people behind them. The only benefit to loud music on earphones is that there’s a high statistical chance of them being flattened by dumptrucks.

5. People who get annoyed online about poor grammar: It’s online, they’re communicating online, they’re basically texting each other but with a computer. It doesn’t have to be good grammar, so if they say “their” instead of “there” or “your” instead of “you’re” I don’t care and neither should you. People who get worked up over it are just the sort of pestering “know it alls” who always have to be right because they weren’t loved properly as children and grew up believing that the world owes them something and mention things so that other people will pay them some attention.

6. People who use poor grammar: seriously, get an education you scum.

7. Emo’s : a fashion sense is one thing, but if you want people to think that you’re on the verge of tears all the time, let me slap you and give you something to cry about.

8. Obesity: People who complain about being obese while doing nothing about to stop being obese, it’s as bad as smokers who quit smoking after every single cigarette. Being fat is not a crime but unless someone is force-feeding you then it’s mechanically still your own fault.

9. Cat people: Because while scientists have proven that cats don’t cause brain tumours, it just means that people who like cats are legitimately crazy. Honestly, have

you noticed how when old people have dogs they’re usually running around, walking with them, enjoying their company in the sunshine and smiling. While cat people, when they’re old are sitting watching television, being walked over by the cats and getting asthma. No, cats are legitimately only good for YouTube videos and that’s only when they’re kittens. To quote a saying, “Cats do not hate you for your race, your gender or your religious standing- they hate you because they’re cats.”

10. Duck lips: it’s a blight upon humanity that this has been allowed to become a problem. While I’m not an expert on this as far as I’m aware there is a difference between a pout and a Daffy Duck impression. The Facebook “Duck Face” phenomenon is not that it makes a girl look cheaper

than a stick of gum, but that it makes you dumber than the wrapper the gum is wrapped up in… and just as disposable.

11. Fanatics: religious, eco warriors, eco nuts, dietitions, campaigners for anything at all in general, signed petitions, sponsored events, Occupy, anyone between the ages of 13 and 18 with an opinion, soccer fans, George Lucas fans, overtanned people, atheists, online trolls, online gnomes, online fairies, pixies and unicorns and forever and always vegans.

There you go. I trust this has been informative for yourselves and that you will make proper use of the information.

Kindest regards and now pass me that baby so I can scribble my name on its face.

Donnie Rust, (AKA The Naked Busker) is one of Britain’s foremost comedy writers in the field of business, travel and adventure with over 1 million readers worldwide. His stand-up comedy is apparently hilarious too. He can be found at: www.facebook.com/donnierust.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 13

IF I RULED THE WORLD

by Rob James I got to thinking that maybe it would be a good idea if I took over the World. Not because I’m an aggressive megalomaniac or an evil genius or anything like that; just as a hobby. I mean, everyone needs a hobby don’t they? I’ve tried various sports, a few arty things and even certain online activities but none of them have held my attention for any length of time. And ruling the World would keep me busy if nothing else.

I haven’t really worked out how to do it yet. I think I’d probably start by trying to gather the disenfranchised – there’s plenty of them around – and rally them to my cause.

I think I could do this; I‘ve always got on well with the disenfranchised. It might be because I’m one of them and therefore we have a lot in common and can converse on a level.

“What have you been up to?” “I’ve been disenfranchised.

How about you?” “Yeah, me too. This is my friend Jeremy, he’s disenfranchised too”. And so on. I’m sure you’ve all had these sorts of conversations on many occasions.

Then when I’ve gathered enough of them we could rise up and overthrow the UK Government. Not only because it’s the country I happen to live in but because it should be easy to do - everyone hates the current UK Government, even more than they’ve hated all the previous ones. For those not in the know, the UK Government is a coalition made up of two parties who hate each other, meaning that even the

UK Government hates the UK Government. I’m thinking some sort of non-violent coup should do the trick. Then I can sweep to power backed by my disenfranchised followers. So, now I’ve got myself a country. All I have to do then is abolish the monarchy, sweep away democracy and bring in a state of perpetuity with me as head of state forever.

So, I’ve got the UK with Gibraltar and the Falklands thrown in for some reason or another. Then what I do is have a whip round of my countries and we raise enough money to start buying all the bankrupt countries. We should be able to pick Greece up on eBay for next to nothing. This might sound like all the debts but no. I’ll get to that. Because now I own all of Europe except Germany and using the EU I can vote myself into the position of President of Europe. Then I can cancel all the debts that my countries owe each other – just wipe them out. Then I could cancel third world debts on the condition that they join my cause. Then I’d have Europe and

Africa. Going well isn’t it! I think I’d probably have a holiday at this point. Somewhere where I ruled so I didn’t have to pay. Yeah, that’d be cool.

Now that I’ve got Europe and Africa I guess it’d be easy enough to send a task force and take over the North and South Poles. I mean, no one really wants them anyway do they; you’d only want them so that you’d get the set. The plan falls down a bit here; I’m not sure how I get the rest of it despite literally minutes of mulling it over. And when the plan gets difficult it brings me on to the next, and altogether more trying, problem. Once I’ve taken over the World, what the hell am I going to do with it? I mean, the World itself will just carry on doing what’s it doing – spinning through space and rotating around the Sun and stuff like that. At least, I hope it will. Would I be responsible for making that happen?

I hope not; I’ve read a few science books and it’s all beyond me. But leaving that aside, however much admin would be involved in ruling the World? Your time just wouldn’t be your own would it? You’d be settling down to dinner and suddenly you’ve got the Philippines on the phone with another natural disaster that you’ve got to sort out and before you know it your fish fingers have gone cold. I wonder if this is why dictators always seem so grumpy? Cos you can get minions in to do your bidding but they always get it wrong and need guidance all the time. And as ruler of the World how do you deal with incompetent minions?

I think you’ve got to go with the nice, people-y sort of way; lots of praise for a job well done, a small gift on their birthdays, that sort of thing. You could go down the Darth Vader route but I don’t think that’d work well. Take the series of incidents that happen in The Empire Strikes Back where Vader kills several of his senior minions with very little provocation. When Han Solo pulls off the most incredible bit of flying and lands the Millennium Falcon on the side a Star Destroyer it’s the ships commander that pays for that with his life. Now it’s probably fair to assume that the man had made it up the ranks excelling at every level to become the ship’s commander. And having got to that level his boss kills him because someone does something unpredictably brilliant. This has to be counter-productive not just to staff morale but also in terms of losing your best people. If Darth had simply taken the guy to one side, chatted through what had happened in a coaching style, seen what they could have learned from it and then let him carry on commanding armed with new information and skills then the Empire might not have fallen in the very next film. Food for thought.

But then, if I was too nice would people rise up and overthrow me? Cos I’ve never fancied being overthrown.

And then I got to thinking that actually this whole ruling the World thing might not be such a good idea after all. So now I’m thinking I might try cookery instead. Everyone needs a hobby after all.

Rob James is a guerilla comedian prefering never to announce a gig in advance and to just turn up. He dislikes organised events, organised political parties, organised religion and organised socks.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 15

Legacy Group www.legacyhotels.co.za +27 11 806 6800 Written by Donnie Rust

BUILDING

a legacy

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 17

Legacy Group

What do you look for in the perfect holiday?

We serve the Hospitality Industry for all your Perhaps you like sandy beaches and beautiful ocean-lit sunsets, bedroom, bathroom and or maybe you prefer wild savannahs of green-yellow grass, or restaurant requirements.

perhaps mountains so tall that clouds have to go around because they cannot go over. We all have destinations that we want to visit, we all have an ideal holiday in mind but for every one of our personal dream vacations there is an underlying similarity, a handful of key elements that we always want. We chat with Paddy Brearley, Managing Director of Legacy Hotels about what it takes to make an ideal destination for their guests.

We stock the following Legacy Hotels and Resorts own and manage 24 properties, luxury Towel ranges, all four or five star bush lodges, leisure resorts, casino and Our Royal Diamond 550gr corporate resorts in key tourism and business locations.

Our Royal Endurance They are expanding into the emerging European and Middle Eastern Anti-Snag markets. The company employees overas 2200 staff Towel as well worldwide andour despite this impressive footprint, Paddy New Eco- Soft (Eco- Friendly) Anti-Snag towel range.

National telephone:

0861 TOWELS Offices in: Cape Town | Durban Garden Route | Johannesburg Email: info@towelandlinen.co.za VISIT OUR SHOP IN CAPE TOWN @ 6We HONEYWELL ROAD (SPOTTY DOG), serve the Hospitality RETREAT INDUSTRIA, Industry for allCAPE yourTOWN

bedroom, bathroom and www.towelandlinen.co.za restaurant requirements.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 18

Brearley speaks about his company as a team of individuals, a tightknit operation where every one of his 2200 staff is as much a key part as everything else.

As a testament to the luxury and standard of the resorts and hotels, whether designed for leisure or corporate feel they are interchangeable, providing effective luxury and professionalism to suit the traveller, tourist or businessman.

“You can spot a Legacy hotel as it is not just about the bricks and mortar, our spacious hotel rooms or fine restaurants,” Paddy says, “Visiting our world is about discovering something new and amazing, a place where you can experience those special moments that will be cherished for years to come.”

Their hotels and resorts have been carefully designed and built to complement the special features of each destination and while each Legacy hotel is unique, they all share a charm, elegance and commitment to service excellence to which the discerning traveller has become accustomed.

“Legacy Resorts have a reputation for warmth and friendliness and as four and five star resorts every one of our employees are focussed on providing the best experience possible for each of our guests,” Paddy explains, “Service is the only differentiator between us and our competition that really counts. Magic Moments is a perfect example of this.”

Magic Moments is a course that has been developed internally by the staff. Instead of being management-lead it owes its cultivation to their understanding of what it takes for Legacy to remain at the top.

“Magic Moments is very simply what happens when a staff member makes a difference,” Paddy says, “Our resorts may be beautiful but it’s the impression got from the staff that really makes a long lasting impression.”

So what does this take?

“The little things,” Paddy elaborates, “Cleanliness is very important, you have to get into the corners where people usually wouldn’t look to go that extra step. Other things like chocolates on the pillows for example. All resorts leave chocolates on the pillows, we just make sure we leave the best ones. When our guests go on our tours we have the best

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

Legacy Group

drinks and snacks. Our aim is not to make people comfortable but genuinely impressed.”

There is also a strong focus on people to people interactions.

“Nothing is perfect all the time and things sometimes go wrong,” Paddy says, “We’re all human after all and experience has taught us that it isn’t that things go wrong or that mistakes are made that make people like you or me unhappy but rather how things are handled. We want someone to smile and assure us that everything will be sorted and then get it fixed as promptly as possible so that we can continue to relax and enjoy ourselves.”

There is a definite culture and attitude that employees immerse themselves into at Legacy which is directly related to the management and directorship. After all, for such philosophies to take hold at such a deeply ingrained level it must start from the very top and filter its way down to the grass roots level.

With a strong eye for the future Legacy is not resting on its laurels or becoming complacent in its position and is looking at the next best locations to set up shop. Expansion into Africa is already occurring as Africa is proving, once again, to be one of the greatest global destinations.

“There are predictions that Nigeria is going to be the biggest African economy within the next decade,” Paddy reveals, “So naturally we want to be there when that happens and, as we’ve learnt, it can take up to two to three years to set things up in Nigeria so we’re going to be starting very soon.”

The basic model of urban expansion states that wherever resources like oil, gold, coal and diamonds are businesses will follow. In ancient times it was wherever the water was and in modern times it’s oil; by strategically placing themselves in the best locations ahead of the rush Legacy Hotels are going to benefit from the increased surge of tourists, travellers and businessmen.

The strategic focus for the future is not exclusive to their locations and staff training, it is also found in their focus on green business and environmental responsibility, as Legacy are well known for their protection of the natural heritage of their continent. More importantly, America and Europe are looking for resorts in Africa that are responsible on a greening/environmental aspect. Countries and companies that make strides in conservation are attracting bigger and better investors and in planning for the future this has a range of long term benefits including job creation, expansion and economic stability.

“We work closely with the Heritage Programme in South Africa to ensure that we are as green as possible,” Paddy explains, “We want to make sure that what we leave behind is as beautiful as what we have today.”

It is inspiring to see a company so focussed on creating something that will outlast any one part. A true Legacy.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 21

Eqstra Fleet Management www.eqstrafleet.co.za +27 11 458 7555 Written by Jack Slater

DRIVING AHEAD

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 23

Eqstra Fleet Management

Last March we featured Eqstra Fleet Management and focused on the winning strategies of MD Murray Price that were responsible for EFM’s pioneering model of niche operation, a single access into a multiplatform of services interacting with strong leveraging customer-beneficial technology.

Jack Slater catches up this time to see how things are going.

Eqstra Fleet Management MD Murray Price

In Britain, the States and mainland Europe there is a sweeping popularity for fleet leasing driven at a corporate level as a means of cost cutting and centralizing the standards through outsourcing. Despite this, South Africa continues to resist as her people still view ownership as an asset.

“It is an asset, but one that depreciates,” Murray Price, MD of JSC-Listed Eqstra Fleet Management, “However this has eluded most South Africans.”

South Africa may have a national consciousness of forward thinking that mystifies most other nations however they can be old fashioned in some of their thinking. With the political, economical and social changes that have resulted in periods of national upheaval for years at a time people have viewed ownership along the same lines as safety.

With this in mind, for most of its 27-year operational history Eqstra Fleet Management has operated in the conventional vehicle leasing market; two years ago, with the banks and independent players like main rival Avis competing strongly against each other in a tight market, EFM made a strategic shift.

“We didn’t want to go purely head to head on rate. This is a thin margin, slim pickings business, but what the analysts like about it is its annuity income, consistent and committed contract.

“So we made the decision that this pure space on its own wasn’t good enough for us and that by differentiating into a services business still underpinned by leasing, we wouldn’t be caught in a price war.

“We would show our customers the benefits through cost analysis of a single access into a multi platform of services versus the cost of dealing with independent suppliers in the chain. Most clients miss this; they don’t see it as a direct cost.”

Offering a range of solutions, EFM bases itself on measurable benefits and significant ROI delivery. Focussing on securing reasonable returns while delivering cost saving

Lindsay Saker Hyde Park benefits to the customer through investment in technology and cutting duplication of effort within the value chain.

“Our by-line ‘Quest for Excellence’ highlights our drive to add further value to our customers, whilst at the same time reducing cost,” says Price. “The achievement of these objectives is supported by our total focus on leveraging technology and the EFM supply chain as effectively as possible. Automation, integration and visibility of processes are central to our methodology.”

From small beginnings as a part of the Hertz group, to a joint venture between Imperial and Nedbank and finally as an integral part of the newly listed Eqstra, EFM is a key player in the Southern African fleet market, with an owned and managed fleet of over 35,000 vehicles and an asset base topping R1.8 billion. As the Africa associate of the Global Fleet Services alliance, EFM is part of a ‘family’ represented in more than seventy-eight countries and managing a combined total of over 1.8 million vehicles worldwide.

For the past five years Eqstra has been growing its managed offering - maintenance, accident management, fines administration, license administration, procurement and remarketing. Each is offered as a standalone service to larger fleet operators who, while not leasing, take from this basket of services to manage and drive down costs.

A key component here is GPS Tracking Solutions, which EFM has brought to the market with outstanding success.

GPS controls real time speed time, enabling fleets to prevent speeding and the associated fines and administration. In some cases the cost benefit can be as high as twenty percent

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Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 25

Eqstra Fleet Management

in terms of both fuel and accidents, says Price.

South Africa’s high incidence of vehicle thefts has led it to become a world leader in telematics, and GPS technology is a development of SVR – stolen vehicle recovery. “Because of the high crime and high jacking rates it became imperative for people to have a device to ensure recovery. On the back of this we grew a huge business under the name of Tracker, mainly through the dealer channel point of sale. That’s where we got our foothold.

“We then arrived at the conclusion that the future of fleet management – the ability to deliver the administrative, supply and cost control portion – would come from having our own tracking technology. And instead of a joint venture, which most of the South African players had done, we went out and acquired a small player - GPS Tracking Solutions. It was a business of the right size at the right time with the right player. We then came up with a breakthrough – being able to cap speed real time in speed zones, and we have a global patent. There will be sensitivities on implementation of course. On a safety issue - ‘what happens when overtaking?

For example - we allow a fifteen second plus spike out.”

Most of EFM’s selling is now around the world class technology Global Positioning System solution, supported by very strong procurement elements. “Ultimately we are looking to change driver behaviour. Generally it’s not poor driving habits; it’s more likely to be their attitude and behaviours that are not congruent with safe driving. By cutting speed we bring down the accident rate – there’s no doubt about that. And the driver knows he is being watched

and monitored. Driver behaviour in this country is a little more reckless than you would see in the UK. It’s a cultural thing.”

EFM has recognised an obvious but often overlooked fact - real driver of cost within any fleet is exactly that; the driver of the vehicle. How the vehicle is operated will impact all cost elements, initial procurement and finance costs aside. To address this EFM has developed an extensive driver management program – the only one in South Africa - designed to change driver behaviour and reduce significant related costs like fuel, maintenance and accident repair.

“We have a comprehensive driver management programme with two very big corporates, and the bottom line impact on accident and fuel costs has been significant,” says Murray Price.

Fleet management cost reduction will accelerate as a result of another EFM initiative, the installation of a new Microsoft AX 2012 software system. “This will bring our customers true fleet management online, enabling them to get quotes, change driver and payment details, access drag and drop cost centres.

“We are doing everything we can to make the customer an inclusive part of the system. We are an IT business that does fleet management, not a fleet management business that does IT. Without systems in this business you are dead in the water.”

What sets Eqstra apart is that it is an all-inclusive fleet management company, says Price. “We provide customised solutions, our own warranties, insurance and along with

front-end accident management, a re-marketing channel, Hypercar, allowing customers to sell their vehicles and get far better returns. We’ve got the full control across the spectrum.

“In South Africa we are saying to customers that we will guarantee you a savings on the monthly rental just on fuel and then over and above that one get the added benefits in terms of reduced accident claims costs, reduced maintenance expenditure and improved residual values.

“Our focus with clients is all about ROI. When we come in and engage with a customer we take his current costs and do an ROI model to show what he will pay for our services and the return he will make. And that’s quite a unique approach.”

Moving forward, Price sees significant growth in the government sector. “Increasingly Government departments are realising they need the help of a professional fleet company to work their fleets more effectively. I see big growth coming in this space.”

And EFM’s trans- continental vision is expanding. “We’ve been operating predominantly in South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Swaziland and Lesotho. But Africa is a longterm opportunity and we are now in Nigeria. It’s a tough operation, very different levels of sophistication from a fleet management perspective. So while it requires quite a bit of flexibility on our side to customise a solution, there is little competition and the returns are attractive.”

Innovative and expansionist, there is little prospect of a speed cap on EFM. “Looking both at the present and the future, these are exciting times for us at Eqstra.”

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 27

Origin Wine www.originwine.co.za +27 21 865 8100 Written by Lance Van Der Westhuizen

THROUGH THE

Grapevine

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 29

Origin Wine

Wine has always been popular; as a worldwide drink of choice it is the beverage that denotes a higher level of class than other alcoholic beverages and, with South Africa benefitting from some of the best grape crops in the world, it’s not surprising that the best companies in the worldwide industry can be found there.

Origin Wine is a service company, providing bottling and packaging services for glass and bag/box wine. They also offer procurement and management of dry goods and have been providing logistical services to the wine making

industry since 2002, growing to accommodate more than 40 million litres of wine per annum.

Their holistic approach guarantees excellent service and they are recognised as the highest professionals in their field providing a ‘one-stop’ service which manages the supply chain from wine making to supply.

“We offer treatment and blending to wine analysis and

label design,” Neville says, “With appreciation for the specifics of the client’s market so that the product received is ready to go onto the shelf.”

Origin Wine maintains the highest level of quality and standards, which have been internationally recognised, year after year, through both International Food Standards (IFS) and British Retail Consortium (BRC). Origin Wines also boasts IPW and DLG approval as well as a Fairtrade accreditation and applies all the principles and procedures set out by the HACCP. “Some people use different combinations of the services offered,” Neville explains, “and this covers just the services

we provide for third parties on a contracting basis. Our services are not restricted to the packaging industry though.”

Covering all corners of their industry they also sell wines, with an export focus for the bottle categories and a flair for diversification and product rejuvenation. An example of this would be their Moscato Range, which they are currently heavily promoting.

“Moscato is a sweet wine,” Neville tells us, “It’s a good wine to get started on if you’re not a wine drinker and is very popular with the younger audiences. It isn’t as matured as some of our other wines and so retains its youth and vibrancy.”

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 31

Origin Wine

Product development is essential for any company and a tailored approach is a sure-fire way to ensure uniqueness and high quality. One of the services that Origin Wines offers is a bespoke development of a label specific to any target market.

With their peerless understanding of the industry they take their customers through the entire process – in particular, wine sourcing and packaging.

“We work closely with the client to ensure that the market specified is guaranteed to be enthralled by the quality of the wine selection,” Neville says, “and intuitively fit between market and product. Origin Wine has access to large volumes of product, as well as a vast array of cultivars and styles available. With price and style needs specified, we are able to source the wine required, blend it to taste and provide the quantities as ordered.”

With their focus on satisfying the needs of the export market, Origin Wine is continually improving their systems and procedures to satisfy the needs of their customers.

Forging long-standing relationships is their primary aim.

“This actually starts internally first,” Neville reveals, “and we focus intensively on employee development.”

The employees at Origin Wines are incredibly important, the company has not gone the route of fully automating

“We are at the forefront of our industry and the top producer and exporter of Fairtrade wines in South Africa.

This is something we’ve worked long and hard for.”

everything and relies more on manual labour. This provides opportunities for on the job training and career development as staff can climb the ranks. Additionally onsite they’ve established a training centre with a host of in house computers for those staff needing it to gain numeracy and literacy skills that will further develop their capabilities on the job and out. They’ve brought in a training consultant to help streamline and head this up.

“The benefit of inhouse employee development is that it allows us to improve not only the quality of life for our employees on an individual basis. But also gives us a good grounding to give additional training for career development,” Neville says.

Standards in South Africa are essential and to ensure that they are offering the best they possibly can, Origin Wine work closely with Fairtrade, a worldwide organisation helping marginalised producers in developing countries, to move towards economic self-sufficiency and stability on a sustainable basis.

“We are at the forefront of our industry and the top producer and exporter of Fairtrade wines in South Africa,” Neville proudly admits, “This is something we’ve worked long and hard for.”

In 2005 Origin Wines in conjunction with the farming communities of Du Toitskloof and the Du Toitskloof winery, formed the Fairhills project, which ensured that the 22 farms contributing to the winery were Fairtrade accredited, making it one of the largest Fairtrade projects globally.

Origin Wine has an on-site blending facility of 2.4m lt and combined with their cold stabilisation, EDI plant and bulk filter capabilities they are ahead of most of their competition. Bottling is an incredibly delicate process and the question is always one of capability. To answer this, Origin Wine developed a world class bottling facility. Whether it’s bottling, labelling or the more technical balance of ensuring oxygen and carbon dioxide levels are managed, Origin Wine operates to strict procedures to meet their clients’ specific requirements.

A total glass filling capacity of 90 000 litres per day, a Bag-in-Box line with a 55 000 litre capacity per day which covers most sizes from 18.75cl to 5 litres, screw caps, cork, synthetic and wax seals offer a variety of closures while labelling options include wet glue or self-adhesive.

Origin Wine has a fully equipped laboratory able to conduct wine chemical analysis; metals and microanalysis can be performed manually or by making use of the latest laboratory technologies. The newest addition is a WineScan which enables them to produce a footprint of each wine from source to final product.

“As an example of our position in the industry, there has been a swing from bulk wines to bottle, in the year ending in July 2010, 239 million litres had been moved in South Africa, in July 2012 that number had dropped to 169 million litres,” Neville explains, “But while there has been an industry dip we’ve grown by 10% which is evidence of our commitment to support our local market.”

Nampak Corrugated has evolved to offer you ‘fit for purpose’ solutions through revolutionary design, production and print technology, continental reach and personal service. All of which is made possible through our innovative operational structure and strategic investments programme, including exclusive packaging software and machinery in the domestic market. This has established us as Africa’s leading manufacturer of cartons and trays, with an array of awards for our highly individualised and diverse solutions, evolved to create the most attractive and protective corrogated packaging.

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Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 33

CHOICE OF TASTE FOR THE NATION IN LOVE WITH CHICKEN Red Crest Farms www.wacoelec.co.za +27 (11) 677 2500 Written by Ben Walker

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 35

Red Crest Farms

It’s twenty years since Tony and Caroline Isemonger started their fresh poultry business on a R100 overdraft. Today it turns over R12 million-plus a month and has a valuation of between R80 million and R100 million. Ben Walker reports.

Tony Isemonger

Britain’s favourite meat is beef, in Germany pork, but for South Africa it’s chicken; per capita consumption 32 kg a year, more than all other meats combined.

While most is sold frozen, in contrast Red Crest, based at Stutterheim in Eastern Cape’s border country, flies high in the pecking order of the discerning, providing dining tables with the finest poultry in the province. Fresh quality products raised in the best conditions and delivered daily to major supermarkets.

With a meat industry production and marketing background, Tanzania-born Isemonger and his wife Caroline started the business in 1992 with limited capital and four employees, selling 2,000 live chickens a week into rural areas.

Winning early recognition in a competitive industry, they quickly widened the strategic concept, expanding by 1995 into processing, and developing a plant on a site in Stutterheim, a picturesque town of 47,000, 70km north of South Africa’s only river port, East London.

If initial quantities were small - 500 chickens a day – impressive growth soon moved Red Crest exclusively into processed chicken. Today 475 employees are producing 100,000 units a week on 300 hectares, all from a highly successful strain of broiler chicken favoured for its high meat yield and good farming performance levels, the fresh brand ‘ANCA Chix’ accounting for seventy per cent of sales and the frozen range ‘Chooks’ thirty per cent.

JF Equipment Machinery cc, a market leader in the poultry processing manufacturing industry for over 22 years, is supplying the poultry industry in Africa and the rest of the world with superior quality poultry machinery.

A fair amount of machinery used in poultry processing abbatoirs are designed and manufactured abroad, which with the rising inflation and sky rocketing exchange rates, can leave quite a hole in the pockets of abattoir owners. With replacement parts for these machines also only available through import, abattoirs tend to experience extended downtime which leads to loss of income.

Recognising the need for a range of poultry processing equipment, over and above that which is currently available, JF Equipment, as international market leaders in this field, has gathered expertise and technology that will best suit the African and International industries. “The quality of machinery available through import is unquestionable, however, the cost of purchasing and maintaining the machinery can be become quite expensive” says Pat Young, Sales Director for JF Equipment. “Developing the kinds of products needed to run an abattoir at full capacity and fulfilling the standards expected of abattoirs internationally, keeping quality and cost in mind is tricky, yet is the driving force of what we do” says Young.

With a dedicated team of experienced individuals and an ethos of progressive improvement, JF Equipment understands the need for their clients to be supplied with quality, cost effective machinery that lasts and has thus established themselves as acclaimed suppliers of robust, stainless steel processing products.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 36

Leading Leading Poultry Poultry Processing Processing Manufacturer Manufacturer JF Equipment Machinery has in the the poultry poultryprocessing processingindustry. industry.

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JF Equipment Machinery hasover over22 22years’ years’experience experience in They..

• • • • •

AreAre international market leaders • international market leaders Develop internationally recognised • Develop internationally recognisedquality qualitymachinery machinery

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Contact Contact us us on:on: 3494 Tel Tel +27+27 (0) (0) 11 11 760760 3494 Email: pat@jfequipment.com Email: pat@jfequipment.com Web: www.jfequipment.com Web: www.jfequipment.com Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

Red Crest Farms

In twenty years of production and marketing acumen Red Crest has established itself as a business model in product knowledge and service delivery, with a current turnover of over R12 million a month and valuation of between R80 million and R100 million. Modestly - for a business that started out on a R100 overdraft - Isemonger concedes it’s “actually quite an amazing story.”

Vision accomplished? “Yes it has, but I’ve got a long way to go.” A new 270 ton cold storage and refrigeration facility is opening in November and further extensions are current at its processing plants, but Tony Isemonger is looking further ahead.

“To survive in this industry you need to profit take off some of the other integrated issues such as feed. There’s quite a lot of saving we could make here by putting in our own feed mill, as well as establishing our own hatchery and breeder farms” (he is chairman of the stand-alone Keystone Hatchery in KwaZulu-Natal) “and we certainly intend to do that.”

Poultry makes up the biggest sector of South African agriculture, grossing more than 23 billion Rand and producing between seventeen and twenty million broiler chickens a week, double the figure of twenty years ago.

But it is an industry with two controversial challenges.

“One of the difficulties we have to contend with is imports from Brazil and Europe, chiefly the Netherlands. This consists mainly of the non-breast meat ‘unwanted’ portions in those countries - drumsticks, thighs and wings. Imports now account for 25% of South Africa’s broiler chicken consumption and it’s really bitten hard in the last three years.

“This is a sophisticated, high technology industry, and it’s stunting the growth of our own South Africa’s poultry

sector. There are moves by the South African Poultry Association to try and stem this flow, and imports at this level are clearly impacting on jobs that could be provided within this country.”

The other big issue is brining injection, with drafted changes to the Agricultural Product Standards Act in place aimed at reducing the total weight of brine in chicken to four per cent. According to the CEO of the Meat Importers and Exporters of SA, David Wolpert, the levels of brine injected into poultry in South Africa are as high as 30 per cent.

“As a company we don’t inject at all,” says Tony Isemonger. ”We have a very different niche market – fresh. It’s what we chose to be in and what we believe has contributed to our survival and profitability. When you start injecting and individually quick-freezing, the refrigeration procedure is hugely expensive. I would have to say that if we did, morally, we wouldn’t inject above a certain percentage.”

Animal welfare is core Red Crest principle. All broiler chickens grown are placed on pine shavings on barn floors with the freedom to move about, and most growing facilities having curtain walled sides opened after brooding periods to allow in sunshine light and fresh air. Rations exclude fish meal and animal by-product meal, and anti-biotics limited to minimum essentials.

“Animal welfare is very important to us. We spend quite a bit of consultation time with the NSPCA (South Africa’s equivalent of the RSPCA) and if we have any animal welfare issues at the plant we call them in. We are very specific about that.”

And for this sixty-year old entrepreneur, welfare ambitions extend into other areas - above all the serious economic and social challenges of the Eastern Cape.

“We are very much Third World as opposed to Gauteng and the Western Cape.

Unemployment at more than 50% is double the national average, and inadequate infrastructure the biggest single handicap.

East London has industry notably Mercedes-Benz – but this could be increased if the port was improved, while elsewhere large scale farming enterprises could get up and running.”

Isemonger calculates that for every one of Red Crest Farm’s 475 employees, another twelve directly benefit in the community “We have a competent and willing workforce, some coming here having never worked in their lives.

“We have good communication with our staff, and a lot of training and on-going training forums. Altogether we are enriching our staff, with quite a number of previously disadvantaged people now in management roles and doing very well.

“When we started providing staff lunches we found absenteeism reduced considerably. Poverty is quite rife in this area, and because each employee is supporting more than a normal household, by providing lunch – especially on a Monday morning – it encouraged them to come to work,

whereas they would have otherwise probably preferred to stay at home.”

Isemonger says his ambition of establishing an integrated feed mill, hatchery and associated features would contribute significantly to the Stutterheim area economy.

“My vision is that within two years we shall move up from 100,000 to 150,000 per week, creating another 150 jobs. In five years I would like to see us with a hatchery or a feed mill and procuring our own raw materials.”

Meantime he detects consumer preferences are moving the Red Crest way. “We feel there’s a move back to fresh poultry and to localised production with deliveries on a dayto-day basis. We believe in producing fresh well-trimmed poultry; well treated, no water, and high value for our customers.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 39

Standard Electrical www.stanlec.co.za +27 11 624 1010 Written by Mike Dunbar

ENERGISE… INCENTIVISE… ECONOMISE.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 41

Standard Electrical

In a country where power shortfalls are a major and continuing constraint on stability and expansion, leading contractor Standard Electrical is returning exponential growth. And says MD Gary Abrahamson, the possibilities are limitless.

So what is standing in the way?

Mike Dunbar reports.

In South Africa, land of eternal sun and power shortages, energy saving is critical and solar that sleeping giant, slowly attracting support.

Meantime almost all electricity production comes from state-owned utility Eskom, struggling to keep up with demand.

Shortages in 2008 led to rolling blackouts, disrupting manufacturing and the crucial mining industry. Eskom says it risks running out of electricity while it builds two coal power stations. And even when open the country will need more energy capacity by 2019 or again face rolling blackouts.

“The economy is being strangled and we need to release the red tape on renewable energy usage,” says Gary Abrahamson, MD of Standard Electrical of Johannesburg, one of South Africa’s largest electrical contracting companies and a leading innovator in energy saving and renewables.

Freed from growth hobbling regulations, Standard Electrical, like the national economy, would skyrocket. “We could grow this business 100% per annum for the next three to five years. There’s no limit to how big we could grow. You can make energy savings in every building you walk in to.”

Standard Electrical’s speciality is installation and energy efficiency, deploying new technology lighting and solar power. Making impressive gains, a monitoring system using motion sensors and linked to air conditioners and now being installed into all client buildings.

“As a result you can tell how many kilowatt hours you use per month and the maximum demand. By monitoring the pulse of the building we analyse how efficient it is. So the temperature in an unoccupied room would be allowed to rise three degrees in summer and go down by the same amount in winter - an energy saving on the air conditioning as well.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 42

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

Standard Electrical

“This is how we achieve up to 50% savings in a building.

On new buildings we can achieve even more - 33% of what they were running at six years ago.

“By putting your buildings meters online on our unique site, we can constantly monitor your building to make sure you are getting the maximum potential from your savings.”

Standard Energy is working with the British company Solarcentury, one of Europe’s fastest-growing and most innovative solar photovoltaics (PV) companies. And Abrahamson, 63, knows about opportunity and growth.

His father Hymie started the business in 1946, and when Gary took it over in 1978 Standard Electrical’s payroll was just eight. Today it employs more than three hundred, and turns over R300- 400 million.

In early 1980s he was growing the business organically at a time when the gold price was rocketing and the mining sector booming. Then in 1987 he bought his first company and moved into a new and bigger league. ”I realised there was a much easier way to grow and that was by acquisition, and in the next nine years I bought eleven electrical companies.” By the time boom dived into recession Standard had already anticipated the market for retro fitting. “We knew we had to get out there and start

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 44

selling ourselves. But with the finest name in the industry it hasn’t been difficult.”

Standard Electrical delivers a total skills package across a wide commercial and industrial field – office blocks, warehouses, shopping centres, hotels and factories. And against the power critical backdrop – and the Government’s pledge to reduce South Africa’s domestic greenhouse gas emissions trajectory by 34 percent before 2020 - Standard Electrical launched a new division, Standard Energy. And it is setting the pace.

“We have a genuine concern for the environment. By raising awareness of the benefits of saving energy we can help reduce strain on the grid by reducing consumption and help reduce the environmental impact from the development sector. And most importantly retrofits are financially viable, with paybacks in most cases less than three years.”

Standard has just completed 130 basements, saving 55 gigawatts in power over three years with Eskom – which requires companies to make a 20% cut in consumption paying for the full retro-fit. “I was able to go to a client and say, ‘I’ll save you 68% of your energy in a basement, save R5,000 per hundred fittings per month, I’ll do it for nothing and you’ll have a three year warranty.’ It was a no-brainer.”

Abrahamson says success like this is the result of smart engineering. “No one has ever done it like this, and now people are copying us. We’ve always been the mavericks and trail blazers in new technology.

“I’ve always had a passion for lighting.” A regular visitor to lighting shows in Europe and America Abrahamson has always kept ahead of latest developments. And it was in the USA five years ago that he discovered a new fluorescent lighting technology with which he was to revolutionise power saving in South Africa and catapult Standard into the Green front line.

Using reflectors and a smaller bulb, a 400 watt fitting for instance could be replaced by a 200 watt while extending the conventional operational range by up to 400%. He brought it back to South Africa, had the fitting made and began installing the technology into a small number of warehouses.

“The whole industry was watching me saying it would never work. In fact it cut the energy used in the old technology by half. It was the first thing I did, and today 90% of warehouses and factories built in South Africa use this technology.”

Training accounts for between one and two per cent of annual turnover. Part of the Black Empowerment group

Crowie Holdings since 2010, Abrahamson says Standard Electrical has been up-skilling the previously disadvantaged for the last twenty years. “Even in the apartheid period we saw the need to do this. If you can get a much larger Black middle class you will have a more stable country. And this is what we have strived for.”

Abrahamson is emphatic about the reasons for success; a highly skilled workforce and the ability to carry out and execute energy efficient installations in both new buildings and retro-fits. “We understand lighting and we understand energy. Put those two things together and you have a winning formula.

“You get lighting engineers who understand lighting and energy engineers who understand energy. But there are not many who can put the two into one package as we can. And this has kept us ahead in the field.

“We deliver on what we promise and there are very few companies out there who have done that. Some have gone to clients and promised a 50% saving and on completion delivered only 20%. We are able to calculate and predict, see where, why and at what time energy is being wasted, and address the problem. On innovation and value we deliver without compromise.”

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

Circlevest www.circlevest.co.za +11 484 7559 Written by Ben Walker

HOMING IN AT THE CUTTING EDGE Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 47

Circlevest

Property investor Circlevest has a wining strategy: developing quality, secure and affordable rental homes for workers wanting to move from townships to Johannesburg’s city centre. Demand is “incredible”, MD Rian Reyneke tells Ben Walker. But to meet it Government and councils must up their game and deliver on political willingness.

For citizens of Johannesburg’s teeming urban rim, the adage ‘Travel is to Live’ comes with a high price.

Research by local investment group Circlevest shows that almost half the disposable income of commuters living in townships like Soweto is spent on daily travelling to Joburg city centre.

“We want to bring the people closer to their work, public transport and other amenities. When we bring them into the Central Business Districts there’s a saving for them,” says Circlevest’s Managing Director Rian Reyneke.

Circlevest’s property arm Ithemba Properties owns and manages more than 3,000 residential units in inner Johannesburg; its target market, commuters living on the city’s urban edge in townships like Soweto and Tembisa.

“South Africa has a housing crisis and our philosophy is to supply quality, affordable, safe and secure residential property.

“With most tenants continuing to have a family home in

the place where they grew up, sending part of their monthly income home to support their parents, our upcoming new slogan is ‘Your Home Away From Home.’”

Start-up families, government and bank employees, teachers and blue-collar workers are prominent in tenant profiles. Many stay long term, and for those who vacate, home-owning ambition and affordability is usually the motive.

“We target this gap market before they can afford to buy their own residential property. Our properties are clean, serviced daily, and very secure, and people are very proud to live in them.”

Ithemba, formed fifteen years ago and bought by Circlevest in 2010, manages a portfolio of fourteen blocks of high rise buildings in and around Johannesburg’s central business district. A typical block has two hundred units, a mix of bachelor and one and two bedroom apartments with secure parking in the basement, and at street level, supportive retail outlets, laundries, convenience stores, and crèches.

2010 began with 500 units and closed with 3,000, a sixfold growth, and Circlevest aims to increase this to between five and seven thousand units by the end of 2013. “This has been a year of consolidation and now we are ready for further growth.”

While the first five hundred units were built on a green field site, Circlevest strategy is now to buy, refurbish and rent. “Land and construction costs as well as the current economic climate have made green field developments too expensive for us to make the commercial returns.

“So we focus on buying existing and dilapidated residential units. We then re-furbish and upgrade, or to a lesser degree buy office blocks and convert them to residential units.”

Purchase target is a block of one hundred units and above.

“The economies of scale are far better for us,” says Reyneke.

“Bigger makes a lot more commercial sense.”

While smaller buildings are still relatively locatable, finding larger blocks of flats or focus portfolios is increasingly difficult. “Not only are they in short supply but they are becoming more expensive.”

This leaves two growth routes for Circlevest/Ithemba says Reyneke: portfolio acquisition, or cherry picking properties close to existing portfolios. “One of our philosophies is to create communities rather than just buildings. We prefer owning an entire block of flats and then we can clean up the streets, make sure it’s safe for a tenant when he leaves the building, put in crèches and other amenities.”

With secure and pleasant living conditions a core priority, Circlevest is closely involved in City Improvement Districts defined geographical areas within which property owners agree to pay for add-on services to enhance the physical and social environment. “A CID ensures the pavements are clean, lights replaced, better security with CCTV in our streets.

“We want to create communities. We might start of with acquiring one building in a dilapidated block but the aim is to eventually own the whole block. This ensures the whole community is improved and uplifted.”

To achieve this Circlevest sees in-house total management through Ithemba fundamental. “We’ve found it’s far better to manage, maintain and service our properties and assets than outsource to a third party.

“Our people are our best assets, especially our building managers - who are almost like house fathers or mothers. We have a continuous training programme and promote from within. Many who started off as security guards and cleaners moved up to maintenance managers and are now building managers. Some will move on further to become portfolio managers.”

But two major issues are now impacting on Circlevest and Ithemba: governmental inaction and affordability.

“Affordability is a challenge for us, and the management of utility bills currently our biggest stumbling block. Our tenants pay for water, electricity and sewage over and above the basic rental, and in each of the last three years the price of electricity has been going up in excess of 35%. So we are going to reach a point where the tenant just can’t afford both the rent and the utility.”

It is a challenge that Reyneke has responded to with energy efficiency programmes - the savings passed on to tenants. At the same time along with other members of the Johannesburg Property Owners and Managers Association, he is lobbying Government and municipalities.

But many on modest incomes cannot afford current rents and Reyneke says the biggest problem for Circlevest and other private players looking for solutions is the shortfall in support from the Government and local councils.

“Grants, or lack of them, is one issue and a big one.

In the Johannesburg inner city you are supposed to get a 40% rebate on rates and taxes if you have multi story residential buildings. This is embodied in legislation but the municipalities are not applying it. So we are in a constant battle with them. If there was the political willingness they would get their house in order and our tenants would get the benefit. Electricity subsidies for our tenants is another item on our shopping list.

“The demand for our type of housing is incredible, and if we could get our hands on another 5,000 new units we could easily let them within a year.” What is missing - assistance from Government in the form of tax incentives or grants would cut rentals further and make it easier for many more people to rent, says Reyneke.

“I just want Government and local council to stick to the basics, in essence basic service deliveries. And this is always where they miss the point. We look after our properties, but they need to fix the streets, sort out their billing problems, and build schools within the CBDs. “At Circlevest and Ithemba we offer a sustainable business for investors, and for tenants, properties that are well managed, safe and secure; a ‘Home Away from Home.’

We have no ambition to be the biggest - just the best.”

As official insurance brokers to Circlevest / Ithemba Properties we wish Rian Reyneke and his team all the success in their future endeavours

AC CHRYSANTHOU & ASSOCIATES (PTY) LTD REG NO: 2012/111335/07 EST. 1989 FSP NO: 8601 Tel No: +27 11 421-0317 Email: insurance@chrysan.co.za P O BOX 2916 BENONI GAUTENG 1500 SOUTH AFRICA

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 49

Black Balance Projects www.blackbalance.co.za +27 31 201 2910 Written by Jack Slater

STRONG PHILOSOPHY STRONG FOUNDATION

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 51

Black Balance Projects

With such competition today it is great to see companies focussed more on social/ economic development and following on philosophies than just making a buck. Jack Slater catches up with Mel Clark Executive Director of Black Balance Projects.

Founded in 2006, Kwazulu Natal-based Black Balance is an economic development and engineering consulting company. A joint venture between Exec Directors Mel Clark and Malcolm Biggar, “When we started talking about a joint venture in 2005 we saw the opportunity to bring our economic expertise and knowledge of engineering to create an entity with broader skills base and one year later black Balance was born.”

Their main focus is government and municipal contracts such as the construction of waste management infrastructure, road and buildings owned by the local municipality, “We have looked to capture a small segment of the South African engineering and property development market, with the majority of our projects being government tenders,” says Mel. There are many benefits to having cornered this particular market, not least of which is the ability to fulfil important areas of the company’s philosophy, “When we are looking at a project we examine both the most effective way to complete it and how it can be used to empower the local community. Sometimes on smaller projects this is not possible, but on the larger programmes we will always try our best to provide the empowerment opportunities to local black owned companies, “ says Mel. “There have been a lot of changes in South Africa since 1994 and the end of apartheid, but unfortunately there are still prejudices to overcome. Being in the position where we can choose to empower local companies and local people we can give them the experience needed to help effect that change.”

To help achieve this empowerment, when Black Balance is involved with a project, it ensures that the balance of the budget is spent in the local community, “Normally there’s an 80/20 split in the budget, with 20 perfect being spent in the community where the project is taking place and the remaining 80 percent will leave once it is completed.

Consequently the amount of money that will enter and benefit the local economy is greatly reduced,” Mel says, “we aim for 50-60 percent of the budget to go directly to people in the local area.”

What Black Balance attempt to ensure is that as much of the construction activity is subcontracted to sizeable community-based organisations, thereby creating opportunity for community based organisations to grow, “So if we have a project worth R20 million, we would divide this into four R5 million contractors and empower four local contractors directly,” says Mel. It is a method that has garnered a lot of interest from the business partners as a way of empowering previously disadvantaged communities, “From a sub consultancy point of view, Black Balance will look to appointing smaller organisations to assist with the volumes of consultancy work and thereby grow these smaller practices into sustainable companies,” he adds.

“In addition, ancillary works associated with our practice are outsourced to companies who need empowerment, this way we hope to contribute to the economic uplift of our beloved country.”

The firm’s current main project is a pipeline that will serve the iLembe District Municipality of Kwazulu Natal.

The total project value is R1.2 billion and could last up to 30 years. The initial phase which has gone out to tender is a R20 million emergency pipeline installation. Currently, many of the rural villages in iLembe do not have access to potable water. Water is either brought in by tanker and held in large storage vessels, or the village may have a borehole with a standpipe. Neither situation is desirable, as residents have to walk up to 200 metres to get potable water, which they then have to carry all the way back to their house, but this new development is set to change that.

“The first stage is a major pipeline that will be laid within the R102 highway road reserve that runs parallel with the coastline about 8km inland,” Mel explains, “From there we will reticulate east and west to reach the towns and villages in the iLembe district municipality,” “With this project we will be reaching some of the most impoverished sections of KZN and hopefully make it so that, by the time we have finished, each person has a tap in their own house and not 200 metres away,” Mel says. “We are already in talks with the procurement department of the iLembe district municipality about how to proceed according

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to our principles. This initial phase had been an emergency installation, but from here we can think more about how to empower the local community.”

“The scale of this project will really enable us to really put our philosophy into practice using local suppliers as much as we can. We will also be working to ensure that the people who work with us at the construction phase will be the ones who will continue to be there for the maintenance and development of the project even after we have left. We are looking to improve people’s lives by given them better access to water and also to boost the local economy at the same time,” It is an ambitious wish-list but that is what Black Balance is about. The challenge now, according to Mel is to secure additional funding the continuing stages of the project, “There is enough investment to put in place the bulk of what we have planned and we are now helping the district to locate extra sources of money that will allow us to get the reticulation extended and the project complete.”

From all of this one thing is clear: Black Balance isn’t so much a company with a corporate philosophy as two men’s philosophy turned into a company, and that’s what makes it work. The desire to use improvement works such as roads or housing or pipelines to really benefit the community where these things are being built in a way that goes beyond the project itself is the firm’s unique selling point, and one that is piquing the interest of both potential and actual clients.

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Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 53

KNOWING WHERE YOU STAND Fairbrother Geotechnical Engineering www.fairbrother.co.za +27 21 715 5470 Written by Don Campbell

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 55

Fairbrother Geotechnical Engineering

As a writer I have had the opportunity to speak with every standard of business and every echelon of manager in business, and after all my years it is still a pleasure to find a really good story; and this is a brilliant story. I had the chance to speak with Paul Fairbrother, Financial Manager of the family owned business, Fairbrother Geotechnical Engineering.

“Our story is actually quite well known by our staff and clients,” Paul tells us. “My grandfather James Fairbrother, who was a mechanical engineer by profession, started the company in 1964 when he needed a borehole drilled in his backyard. After losing patience with the unreliable company he had paid to do it, he decided to do it himself.”

This, ‘do it yourself’ attitude, is what Paul refers to as the ‘innovative spark’ that seems to be at the spine of the business setting at Fairbrother Geotechnical Engineering.

“He didn’t have a machine to do it so he designed one himself and built it using part of a forklift and a gasoline motor and proceeded to drill his own borehole. A neighbour saw the result and asked him if he could do the same on his property. This sort of word of mouth advertising continued until he was able to do it for a living’’. His sons, Ian Fairbrother (Civil Engineer) and Peter Fairbrother (Chartered Accountant) joined the company in 1979 and 1986 respectively and remain a strong presence in the management team to date.

In 1990, Adrian Meerburg joined the company and has been a vital part of the company’s success and currently manages the operations of the company.

There is a genuine pride in Paul’s voice as he speaks about the company he is part of and it is clearly more than just something he was born into.

“There is a legacy of innovation that was passed from my grandfather to my Uncle Ian,” Paul explains, “who won’t think twice about designing something new, cutting up an old machine or adding other parts to it. He’s like MacGyver, but just more reliable ’’.

The company still places a heavy emphasis on ‘out of the box’ thinking as they value innovation as one of their core values together with quality and pride in their service provided.

“The drilling experience gained by doing boreholes led to the acquisition of expertise in geology, so the logical Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 56

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

Fairbrother Geotechnical Engineering

development was to expand into geotechnical core drilling services.” Paul tells, “This sort of expertise has increased over the last forty years and the geotechnical core drilling services later expanded into lateral support, pipe jacking and piling. We now provide a full range of geotechnical services which include both design and construct solutions’’. ‘’This means that we are normally the first onto a site, albeit for the geotechnical drilling investigation, specialised foundations or dewatering services.”

The projects are often custom designed and constructed to suit the specific needs of the client. It could be lateral support that is often needed to provide support for excavations of deep basements or vertical piles to support the load of a superstructure or SEWP’s (Self Erecting Work Platform) for marine drilling work.

More than 50% of their work is negotiated with the balance coming from tenders. It’s a situation that has resulted from earning a reputation for quality work and reliability which has built personal relationships with consulting engineers and clients. Geotechnical work more often than not has more than one solution to any particular project and it often comes down to the innovative, real and economic solutions that can be offered that set you apart from your competitors. Paul maintains that it’s not what you’re doing, but how you are doing it.

“On the same note, due to the limited or short duration of most of the contracts and the nature of the industry, it requires the company to be efficient in the execution of projects and have the ability to be quick out the starting blocks for a new project’’.

On the employee level they have just over 100 permanent

staff working with them and up to 50 contract staff at any one time (depending on contractual needs), immersing themselves in the industry and receiving on the job training.

A mentor system has been set up where the junior members of the team are mentored by the seniors. Vast training programmes enhance the skill settings of each individual and internal promotion is a key factor to ensuring that the strong attitude of the company continues.

Speaking about the industry, Paul describes that there is a lot of exciting developments taking place, one of which being the renewable energy market with the emergence of a vast number of wind farms within SA. The company has also benefited from government spending on infrastructure such as roads and tunnels, which provide plenty of geotechnical work.

“Cape Town is a fantastic market for what we do,” Paul reveals, “The soil profile is unique and we have adapted our equipment to cater specifically for this, giving us the dynamic edge’’.

“As we are usually called in to do preliminary drilling work on possible construction sites, it’s often a good economic indication for what’s to come.’’

Future plans include more work in the piling market, and possibly more work in Southern Africa as they still maintain equipment in countries such as Angola. Ultimately their approach will always be the same.

“One project at a time.”

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 59

Arup www.arup.com +27 11 218 7617 Written by Martin White

SHAPING A BETTER WORLD

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 61

Arup

Endeavour Magazine speaks to one of the most exciting and dynamic consulting engineering firms in the world and learns how the company that brought you unmistakable landmarks such as the Sydney Opera House is making great strides towards a clean and sustainable energy future in Africa.

Since being established in 1946 Arup has grown to become one of the world’s leading multidisciplinary engineering firms. The company rose to prominence through its unique and unconventional approach to structural engineering and design which is evident in some of the company’s most famous projects such as the Sydney Opera House and the Centre Pompidou, Paris. Although the company began as a structural engineering firm, it’s technical remit has developed to influence all areas of the built environment from commercial & residential property, leisure, arts, culture & sport and education through to transport infrastructure such as highways, rail, maritime and aviation. However, one of the most dynamic markets for the business is the Energy sector particularly within the company’s African operations as explained by Poya Rasekhi, Arup’s director of African energy projects.

“The company is focused on all areas of infrastructure from transport through to energy production, transmission and distribution. The energy sector presents a number of unique challenges in terms of efficient supply of oil and gas and power production through low carbon thermal and renewable energy sources.”

The key challenges affecting power producers and consumers all over the world are in maintaining a balance between sustainable supply, demand management, efficiency and carbon reduction. These challenges are more apparent in developing African markets which face significant challenges in terms of supply shortages, increasing demand, rising energy costs and increasing international pressure on environmental concerns. Arup responds to these challenges by delivering innovative, practical solutions from energy production through to transmission with a focus on delivering clean, affordable and secure energy supply.

“The energy sector presents a number of unique challenges in terms of efficient supply of oil and gas and power production through low carbon thermal and renewable energy sources.”

Poya Rasekhi, Arup’s director of African energy projects

The company’s commitment to developing solutions to support energy security and price stability are evident within its project portfolio within the oil and gas sector. Arup is currently involved in development of the largest pipeline project in South Africa for transportation of multiple different grades of refined fuels including petrol, diesel and aviation fuel from the coast to a main inland fuel terminal in Gauteng. The 556km pipeline project valued at US$2bn will serve multiple depots and pumping stations on route with capacity for further stations to be added to the network in line with increasing demand for fuels. The planned capacity of the network is expected to meet future in land demand for fuels in the region for the year 2030.

Power generation is a key strategic market for the business.

In addition to the development of low-carbon thermal power projects to support the balance between sustainable supply and growing demand for energy in emerging markets; the company is involved in an extensive and diverse range of renewable energy projects as Poya explains: “We have a current portfolio of 25 projects with an eventual output of 1500 MW to the grid. These projects utilize multiple sources of energy from micro scale hydropower through to wind power, geothermal energy, bio fuels and concentrated solar power.”

One of the ways in which the company has excelled in the energy market is through its localised approach in working closely with operators, investors and developers to develop bespoke solutions for generation, transmission and

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Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 63

Arup

distribution. The company specialises in providing practical advice on energy technology and infrastructure based on accurate financial modelling to provide clients with solutions to meet energy demands whilst also improving carbon performance.

“Although this is a new market for us we have been able to apply our European market experience to our local market knowledge. We have developed our position as the preferred consultant to all major investors in this market and Eskom which is currently the largest producer of electricity in Africa.

On a local level Arup is supporting non-profit power producers to develop a number of wind energy businesses for the support of communities in South Africa, but also Arup has a proven track record in developing significant EON Consulting provides pragmatic management consulting services and solutions to businesses in the Energy, Finance and Transport infrastructure sectors. Our experienced team of experts develops clear and curve-leading strategies to help you address strategic, tactical or operational challenges, enabling your business to succeed by implementing solutions that add tangible value. We are a preferred renewable technical advisor to Arup.

improvements in energy efficiency. The company is able to offer services designed to reduce energy consumption for individual buildings or even develop systems to improve energy efficiency for groups of buildings and large industrial facilities. This is achieved through the firm’s own extensive technical knowledge in energy efficiency but also through the company’s international network of industry leading technical partners.

A factor that allows the company to be so adaptable lies in how the business is structured. Since it was founded, Arup has remained an independent organisation wholly owned by its employees, featuring a flat management structure for a company of its size. This structure has been instrumental in supporting the company’s growth through flexibility and depth in skills by promoting a culture of team working, freedom of innovation and staff development.

Financial performance has also been strong despite the difficult conditions in the financial and civil construction sectors worldwide with the business growing global income to above USD $1.5 billion annually whilst demonstrating positive net cash flow and healthy operating profits. This performance is testament to the company’s unique, forward thinking and independent approach and undoubtedly one which will see the company continue to demonstrate great achievements long into the future.

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Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 64

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Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

UNEARTHING VALUE Lesego Platinum www.umbono.co.za +27 11 484 5005 Written by Chris Farnell Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 67

Lesego Platinum

Perhaps the defining characteristic of the Lesego Platinum Project is their quest to find value where other people have missed it. This can be seen in everything they do, starting with the very selection of the mining site.

The Lesego Platinum Project will be exploiting a 40 million ounce deposit, or 204 million tons of platinum group metals at a grade of 5.95 grams per ton. Once the project goes into full operation CEO Dorian Wrigley expects the site to turn over 250,000 to 300,000 tons a month.

That’s 250,000 to 300,000 tons a month of ore containing

a metal rarer than gold and, many would argue, more useful, with platinum being used extensively in the electronics, chemical, pharmaceutical, automobile and petroleum refining industries.

Yet initially the mining site was seen as not worth the effort. The Lesego Platinum Project and its backers, such as niche investment group Umbono Capital and Village Main Reef, were able to initiate the project due to the government’s introduction of “use it or lose it” legislation, that required mining companies to begin actually exploiting the resources on land they held if they wanted to maintain the mining rights.

“We were in the right place at the right time to take

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“We were in the right place at the right time to take advantage.” CEO Dorian Wrigley advantage,” Wrigley admits. “Back then we thought the site had high grade ore but it was deep. Estimates suggested the platinum was at around 2,000 metres below surface, and even today that’s considered a long way down.”

However, further research revealed that the site was a much better prospect than previously thought.

“We spent $5 million running seismic tests and drilling holes and realised that this was actually a 1,200 metre project, so it started looking a lot more attractive,” Wrigley explains.

“Then on the back of that we started a full feasibility study in 2008.”

Of course these days saying “We began our enterprise in 2008” will cause anyone listening to physically wince, as it was perfectly timed to see the global economy take a severe

beating. But the Lesego Project didn’t back down.

“Back then people weren’t funding existing platinum producers, let alone new projects,” Wrigley remembers.

“So we pitched the project to the Industrial Development Corporation of Southern Africa (“IDC”). In exchange for 150 million Rand the IDC earned a 22% stake in the project to fund the feasibility study. We’re at the tail end of that feasibility period now and we’ve been able to prove the resource starts at a very shallow 350 metres!”

For those who are counting – that’s almost 6 times shallower than the original estimates of the project’s depth.

And while starting out in 2008 might seem like the worst possible luck, in actual fact the project’s timing seems to have helped it dodge a bullet.

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 69

Lesego Platinum

Playing the Long Game “Because we’re not a producer yet we haven’t gone through the turmoil and ups and downs that our colleagues have been going through in the market,” Wrigley says. “We plan to go into production at a time when electricity supplies aren’t a problem and Pt prices have recovered. So we haven’t suffered any of the market force conditions our peers have suffered.”

The biggest challenge the project is likely to face is timing on raising the capital to bring it into production.

“Our dilemma is whether to look for funders now who are prepared to invest a billion dollars into a very exciting Pt mine, that will be producing when the world needs platinum, or to wait until the demand for platinum increases before doing so. We don’t need the whole billion in equity, but that’s the level of financing we need to bring the project into production.”

The long term nature of the project brings new challenges with it, but also new opportunities. This brings us back to the main characteristic of the Lesego Platinum Project: Its ability to see value where others haven’t.

“A large part of what motivated us to get into this business was to see if we could do mining differently in South Africa. The heritage of the mining industry here isn’t one we’re proud of,” Wrigley admits. “Migrant labour, led to the destruction of family units as fathers were taken from their homes. Working that way doesn’t create a healthy community.”

It’s not a problem that’s unique to South Africa. Across the world mines have been set up to take whatever value possible from the land, then abandoned the local community once the resources run out.

“We saw this and thought, ‘There must be a way of doing this differently.’ So when we started out we made it our aim to build the community around the mine, not just have this big operation on their doorstep without them seeing any benefits from it,” Wrigley says.

With it still being some time before the Lesego Project goes into production, the company has a unique opportunity.

Skill shortages are a problem for much of the mining industry, in South Africa as much as anywhere else. Often this problem is solved by bringing in migrant workers from elsewhere in the country or further afield, but Lesego has a unique opportunity to help build a skill base, beyond its own requirements, of potential employees from school level onwards.

“Right now we’re working with schools in the local community,” Wrigley tells us. “We have an incredible opportunity to encourage the students. We’re directing them towards the right kind of skills, engineering, geology, as well as practical hands-on artisan training. We have an opportunity to help the community develop the very skills that will be needed to build the workforce we’ll be using for the next 50 years.”

Doing It Differently It’s an approach that means that the most cost-effective, best practice decision also happens to be the ethical one.

“If you arrange it so that local labour is also the most skilled, then it makes sense to use them. So we’re giving youth a vision that will help them over the next 45 years,” Wrigley points out.

Their efforts go further than simply teaching local people the skills needed to work in a platinum mine however. The project is working closely with three of the closest local communities, partnering with schools and putting in place sustainable measures that hopefully will keep the area growing long after the last ounce of platinum has been taken out of the mine.

“Our social and labour plan focuses on business development and enterprise development in a way that is not focused on the mine,” Wrigley explains. “Because eventually the mine will shut down we want to create an environment and an economy that will last a lot longer than that.”

This is an approach that goes back to the very beginning of the Lesego Platinum Project. Umbono opened the project up with two Broad Based Empowerment trusts - a leadership development trust and an educational trust. Ultimately, the project will help find a resource far more valuable even than platinum.

“Our trusts focus on taking kids out of the most obscure township schools. We’re looking for the really brilliant ones who will flourish if they get a world class education. We’re looking for the Einsteins in small rural schools. Schools that are trying their best but are unable to provide the degree of stimulation to truly stretch some of these brilliant kids.”

Wrigley says. “We mentor them and we’ve seen them go into top universities like Harvard as well as many of the local universities in South Africa. So that’s the ethos with which we started this whole thing and we’d like to see it continue within the communities we’ve been influencing.”

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 71

Pro Roof Group www.proroofgroup.co.za +27 16 450 5800 Written by Jack Slater

HARD AS STEEL

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 73

Pro Roof Group

Manufacturing and distributing may be what they’re known for, producing a wide variety of steel products but Pro Roof Steel Merchants are also most notably known for roofing solutions. Director of Pro Roof Steel Merchants, Rafik Mohamed speaks with Jack Slater.

It is a founding principle that has led this company to go from humble beginnings in 1988 to becoming one of the most prominent steel merchants in Southern Africa. The company has three branches and provides quality steel products to a number of different industry sectors.

“It’s the people that make the company,” Rafik points out, “It’s important to empower the workforce because without the people, there would be no business,” In 1994 Pro Roof Steel Merchants expanded its Vereeniging operation by acquiring cut to length and slitting lines, thereby improving their offerings to their customers. The operation was further enhanced in 1997 by commissioning a cold formed sections plant. In 1998 a gate and fence manufacturing division was established. In the same year Pro Roof Steel Merchants entered the export market and, since then, the group has been supplying various steel and allied products into numerous export markets in addition to its South African commitments.

The Cape Town operation was established in 1999 and the manufacturing capabilities of the group were further enhanced by acquiring the first of several tube mills. In 2001 the group branched into selling structural steel sections and has since become a leading supplier in the flat and long steel products market.

Further cut-to-length and slitting lines were introduced in 2002. The Durban operation was established in 2006 in Edwin Swales Drive, Rossburgh.

A great strength of Pro Roof Steel Merchants is the diversity of the economic sectors that its product range services. Although it started as a roofing company back in 1988, it has expanded its product range to most steel products commonly used in the various markets it operates in.

The group identifies the key to its sustainable growth as being the ‘determination to succeed and a total commitment

to customers and employees alike’. Investment must also play an important part as Mohamed reveals that they are planning to invest R50 million in new equipment and R100 million in another mill.

Pro Roof Steel Merchants currently employs approximately 550 staff members throughout its three service and steel processing centres situated in Vereeniging, Cape Town and Durban. A large contingent of the staff employed are technical staff who are required to operate and maintain the various manufacturing and processing equipment within the group.

Pro Roof Steel Merchants has also acquired a fully automated, state of the art ‘Welded Beam Line’. This line produces universal columns and beams as well as T-beams in a wide range of sizes for various applications. Beams and columns can be manufactured from 300WA, 350WA, grade 50B and corten.

The production process consists of three coiled steel strips being fed simultaneously into the beam machine to form a web and two flanges. The product passes through the ‘beam forming station’ and is then welded to form a high quality, lightweight product. High frequency resistance welding is a versatile and productive method for the manufacturing of H, I and T welded beams.

“While hot rolled beams have proven suitable for heavier sections, various limitations exist which are not generally recognized. It is difficult, for example, to roll beams with significant differences in thicknesses between web and flanges. Beams with dissimilar metal components for increased sectional strength cannot be rolled. Obviously none of these traditional hot rolled limitations will apply to the high frequency welding process used to manufacture high quality and lightweight structural solutions for our ever increasing customer base.”

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The welded product produced by this line find applications in a wide variety of industries and sectors such as building and construction, fabrication, mechanical manufacturing, overhead cranes, truck, container and trailer manufacturing, roadside guardrails, marine vessel construction and many more. One of the advantages of using a welded beam versus a hot rolled beam is a weight reduction in the range of five to 30%, and this clearly has an obvious benefit for Pro Roof customers. Fabrication time and labour costs will also be saved due to the lightweight properties of the welded product.

Pro Roof Steel Merchants still maintain their roots in the roofing market and are one of the largest manufacturers of roofing solutions in South Africa. The three most common and popular roofing profiles (corrugated, IBR, widespan) are manufactured in-house at Pro Roof’s various service and steel processing centres in South Africa. They can provide these profiles in both galvanised and colour coated finish.

These are available both for the South African market and for export.

Although with these profiles, Pro Roof also offer several value added services and roofing accessories commonly used in conjunction with those three profiles.

The success of Pro Roof lies in their knowledge and skill base in the steel manufacturing and distribution area and, as they continue to invest in the people they employ, this is one company that will be able to shout about its achievements from the rooftops.

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2012/08/27 3:58 PM

Thos Begbie www.thosbegbie.com +27 13 246 1134 Written by Mike Dunbar

BRIGHT NEW WORLD

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Thos Begbie

Engineering for the mining sector is a precession industry. It’s tough and it’s heavyweight; mining and smelting operations remote and hard to access. As Eugene Rossouw and I talk, just minutes away vast pieces of smelting equipment, some weighing 50 tonnes, are being assembled at the Thos Begbie plant at Middelburg, in the Eastern Cape Karoo. Within days they will be loaded at Johannesburg Airport 167 km north and flown on to Adelaide, South Australia.

Rossouw is joint CEO of Thos Begbie, global specialists in the manufacturing of smelting equipment for the mining sector with a R350-million a year turnover. “Each competitor in the world market place has niches but when it comes to a company solely dedicated to smelting equipment the big seven dilutes to two – ourselves and an American competitor.

We have the bigger plant and we believe we deliver more equipment. We like to say we are the leader.”

Recent and current major contracts span seven global regions and include a China-based project with engineering consultancy Hatch to build the largest calcium carbide furnaces in the world, three Australia-based smelting assignments for mining giant BHP Billiton, and a R40 million order for Chile. “The open communication, willingness and

commitment of the team members involved were key to the successful outcome,” says a Hatch executive, underlining Thos Begbie’s belief in the cruciality of developing a strong network and well-manage relationships. “For us the customer is always right,” says Eugene Rossouw.

“A vast foundry, heavy engineering works and pipe manipulation divisions gives us the versatility to cope with the demanding mining and pyrometallurgical industries’ requirements. And we have a unique situation – and one of the reasons why we can do what we do - a full assembly floor.

“We can do a full mock assembly of the equipment so that when the entire furnace is fully made up we can match mark all components which can then be shipped in sequence and re-erected in sequence on site. No dribs and drabs; you know that every single part fits together perfectly.”

Serving an industry where operational crisis blow up in a second, Thos Begbie is on the emergency list of some of the biggest mining names in twenty countries. Rossouw’s colleague and joint CEO Edwin Dreyer says the team’s around-the-clock availability along with ISO 9001 rating and South African Bureau of Standards accreditation, are high among its success factors.

“A simple phone call gets us going immediately and we’ll be in full production within hours, especially if we’ve manufactured similar items before and have the patterns and designs on hand.

“This ability to process emergency orders is what gives Thos Begbie a competitive edge, says Dreyer.

The company is 125 years old, founded by Glaswegian immigrant Thomas Begbie in the year of Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee and the publication of the first Sherlock Holmes story, ‘A Study in Scarlet.’

For Thos Begbie it is a study in durability, excellence, innovation and adaptability. “In 125 years this business has moved through many different phases,” says Rossouw, 58.

“Twenty years ago and employing nearly 600 people in our plant, we didn’t produce one iota of the money value turnover we have today. We saw the futility of competing where low wage rates were a major factor in competitive pricing and began closing down ‘grunt’ factories and focusing on a highly specialised and niched market. And this has been part of the success of the business.”

In a tough industry, another and softer philosophy for success, and one flowing from the company’s long and proud history - the encouragement of family involvement and development.

“When you look at the employees in the company, more than anything else you have the family generations. One particular family here has four generations who have worked for the company, with a great grandson a qualified artisan.

His father works with him in the plant and his grandfather and great grandfather started here. In total probably ten members of the associated family have worked for Thos Begbie. And this makes us a family company to a degree I think unique. And it makes people extremely passionate about the business.

“I’ve looked at so many businesses that are impersonal towards their employment structure, people are just workers, and they don’t know them or care about them. When they become part of the family you start caring about them.”

In a world market sector where commodity prices are uniform and competition is decided by quality and valueadded, cheap labour countries are not a threat says Rossouw.

“When I cite our competing countries I never mention places like China, or India. They are always a potential threat, but the labour percentage of the price is not high. A massive casting costing maybe 30,000 dollars may take ten hours of work, and if a Chinese was earning one eighth of the labour rate of one of our workers, it would translate into a 20 dollar advantage in a 30,000 dollar piece of equipment. That’s not where it is.

“So Germany, America, South Korea – a new entrant and not a cheap country - there’s a plant in Italy and we’ve seen a small upstart in Brazil. Then there is us, and we are all competing in the same market and play off the same ball game - price.

“For more than seventy years we have been making equipment for a particular industry and a very very niche market. This market is not under threat because of the very nature of the product. As always the threat is that somebody comes up with a better methodology.”

The other threat is the price of copper.” Making the equipment in high purity copper is very expensive. Today copper sits at $7,500 a tonne, and you are making bits and pieces of equipment weighing in excess of a tonne at a time” With electrification in power generation troubled South

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Africa scheduled to double – Rossouw sees increased opportunities of using high conductivity materials with Thos Begbie moving into other related copper and aligned products.

“The foundry industry is not the easiest in the world.

Times are tough and you’ve got to want to be successful and do things properly every single day. So we have total commitment to quality – we never compromise. Otherwise you will be bitten – every time a coconut.”

Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 • 79

25 YEARS OF KNOWING YOUR MARKET Concargo Global Logistics www.concargo.co.za +27 21 930 9160 Written by Don Campbell

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Concargo Global Logistics

Companies the world over are pushing into Africa, establishing footprints and developing their strategic plans for a continent that will soon be overtaking the rest of the world in terms of profitability. Don Campbell speaks with David Kruyer, Chairman and Managing Director of Concargo.

Celebrating 10 years of success recently, TESA has evolved and diversified from the local domestic market and construction industry to become a significant fabrication solutions contributor to international industry. With four awards since 2008, two at International level, TESA has attained recognition and cemented its status as market leader in the supply of fabrication solutions in the African telecoms market.

Key competencies are many and diverse. Unique research and high volume manufacturing processes have won significant market share by successfully meeting blue chip quality and audit requirements through innovation and superior commitment to customers. The end result is a series of lasting value – customer partnerships.

TESA take pride in commitment to quality and levels of service and after sales service beyond the expected and are ISO 9001: 2008 Quality System listed, a trademark on their unique fencing pale and is a member of the Hot Dipped Galvanizing Association of South Africa.

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In a nutshell, Concargo is a multi-faceted, non-asset based Logistics Company providing Abnormal Heavy and general Road Transport throughout Southern Africa.

With a strong emphasis on pushing into Africa, benefiting from international affiliations, they have a turnkey style of approach to business and over the last quarter of a century have dutifully ensured that they have the capabilities and drive to suit all needs of their clients. Cross border transport of bulk and part loads, road freight haulage, air, sea, warehousing, storage, handling and distribution of goods, contract logistics, offshore specialist services, multimodal container logistics, spectrum track and trace surveillance and marine transit insurance across the supply chain.

“When I established the company in 1987,” David says, “It was moving shipping containers named Containerised Cargo.

We’ve grown to cover a wide suite of services because of the manner of our organic growth. Growing in little steps.”

Concargo serves a select yet diverse base of local and global companies, including clients operating in industries with unique supply chain requirements such as the printing and publishing, technology industries and other supply chain organisations in need of their diverse range of transport and allied services. Speaking with David you get the strong sense that he has a fundamental understanding of the needs of the companies he works with.

“You have to know your market place and your clients,” he insists, “All companies are unique but share common requirements and sometimes you need to bring these to a client’s attention. “ With their plug and play reputation preceding them, the group makes use of a full arsenal of business tools that thrust them ahead of the competition. Combining a global network of IT systems, strong cross border relationships and strategic partnerships with clearing and forwarding service providers with their complete understanding of their industry to deliver a competitive advantage to each of their clients.

The staff of Concargo benefit from onsite-on-thejob training, where practical understanding of their roles becomes more important than a theoretical knowledge of it.

“For the client there is a difference between simply knowing your industry,” David explains, “And understanding your industry.”

Road freight is a crucial business in South Africa and Africa, railways are unreliable and air and sea freight can be costly, leaving the roads congested with competition. In fact, there is something to be said for any company that has been thriving in this industry for the last twenty five years.

Our products include large scale steel fencing and fabricated and engineered products that are manufactured including antennae brackets, solar panel structures and supports, enclosure awnings, grillage/foundations, gantry poles and tower templates. The products continue to evolve and are easily adaptable to budgetary and operational requirements with emphasis on project deadlines.

Website: www.tesafencing.com Head Office: 0861 929292 Sales: +27 8287 29545 for English – Scott@tesafencing.com + 27 7249 96991 for Chinese – Richard@tesafencing.com + 27 7994 75056 for Portuguese – Mario@tesafencing.com Engineering: + 27 21 551 2955 Sales fax: +27 21 551 8883 Endeavour Magazine • September 2012 •

Concargo Global Logistics

“We’re all about the personal touch,” David assures, “Your clients and customers need to know that they can trust you. The personal touch is something that the bigger companies sometimes lack, but without it how can you build lasting relationships?”

And David is not stingy when it comes to his insights and acquired intellectual property, having put together a 185 page tutorial on the Concargo website detailing and breaking down the ins and outs of working in Africa. This is made available not only as reference but education to his staff and the industry as a whole. This isn’t just an act of altruism on Dave’s part but a means to raise the standards of this sector to enable and spur growth and development.

“It boils back to the client, everyone has to have a clear picture of what’s involved with working in Africa.”

Throughout its history there has been eager diversification based on its organic growth, this does reveal from a managerial point of view a very open-eyed approach to running a business. Nothing has changed.

“Our African Initiative is of great relevance to us,” he explains, “We’re operating Road Freight now through Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and Swaziland and from South Africa into all of Sub-Saharan Africa. We also provide Ocean and Airfreight across the continent of Africa, wherever it would be faster or expedient. We have an interest in green sectors affecting Oil and Gas and a very keen interest in Mining Logistics,”

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David radiates a keen insight to the direction of the future movements in the company and there is no talk about leaving Africa at the moment.

“There is unprecedented growth in Africa currently,” he reveals, “Resources from minerals, precious metals, gas and oil are being discovered in every country on the continent.

And today there is an even bigger move into Renewable Energy in both Wind turbines and Solar Power.”

Enterprise development has become a hallmark movement for Concargo, focussed on social upliftment for those with the drive to succeed.

“Through this vehicle we have the chance to help emerging companies follow our success story and capitalize on the movements and steps we’ve already made,” David tells us, “This will help raise the standards not only of our Group but also the diversified ideas we can offer.”

Every company needs to highlight themselves against their competition and their differentiating factor is their longevity, “If you’re able to survive in the industry for twenty five years there’s something to be said about your worth,” they are also very prolific in their e-marketing. “You need to identify your market and know your clientele, e/marketing is still an efficient manner of reaching people but the difference between being welcome and being spam is the interest of who you’re sending it to.”

“The road to success is truly reserved for those with the foresight to plan ahead.”

HOW REFRESHING

by Donnie Rust

I’ve been waiting to write about this for an entire year, since I saw SEXPO in 2011 and I finally have my chance. Why am I so excited this,” Arthur points out, “That’s the that we want to take this. In this about writing about this exhibition of adult level industry you have to go big for people to take you seriously and to break free.” orientation and lifestyle?

And this is why SEXPO South Africa

Because in no small manner I think SEXPO is the most important thing to happen ever. I had the chance to speak with Arthur Kalimaris CEO of SEXPO SA to get a behind the scenes look at what goes into the exhibition.

Australia, a country famous for its free will, strength of character and Crocodile Dundee, was the first to have a SEXPO in 1997. It took place in a couple of rooms in a hotel where a handful of people arrived. Within a decade it was in almost every major city in Australia, five years ago it came to South Africa and three years ago it was bought by owner and founder of Adultworld.co.za, South Africa’s largest supplier of adult orientated products, merchandize and toys.

“I’ve been in the industry for twenty seven years,” Arthur reveals, “And had never even thought about having such an exhibition in South Africa. I visited the exhibition five years ago and saw what it was about and was simply blown away.

I bought the South Africa brand three years ago, applied my experience from the industry to it and it’s grown by twenty percent every year since.”

There are businesses in the oil industry that haven’t seen such growth and it’s to a very simple approach that Arthur attributes their success.

“People are up for it,” he says, “We make sure that there is something for everyone and while it’s all to do with the sex industry there are different levels and everyone has an interest in it and those who aren’t, don’t visit.”

The exhibition runs for several days and features hundreds of exhibitors being able to directly interact and engage with people while performers take place on stage the likes of which are seen only in Vegas.

“That’s how much time and money has been pumped into

is so important. It is the perfect opportunity for breaking free, for tearing down boundaries and enjoying yourself.

The world’s opinion on things has changed, what was taboo for our parents is household for us and as everyone becomes more connected via the internet our awareness and more importantly our interest in things that are taboo has increased. Additionally there is the excitement shared of actually visiting such an exhibition where you know you will be one in a thousand or in this case one in a hundred thousand and there’s every opportunity you’ll run into someone you know at a SEXPO. It unites people under a common banner.

Lifestyle and liberty are not taboo and should not be and people are more ready now than ever before with the meteoric/unexpected/unexplainable success of “Fifty Shades of Gray” and its sequels.

“Even I don’t know why Fifty Shades of Gray has been so popular,” Arthur admits, “But I can see a correlation between its success and Sexpo’s. When everyone is doing something, whether reading a book about bondage or visiting an exhibition that includes bondage it’s no longer classed as taboo. But no I haven’t read the book… yet.”

While I have yet to meet a man who is able to admit to reading the book, no one can argue its success. When a book about sex and bondage sells over five million copies in its first four months, when you think previous bestsellers like Stieg Larsson’s’s “Girl with a Dragon Tattoo” took four years to sell twenty million copies, you can’t argue that a consciousness shift is coming or has already arrived. This is all good news for SEXPO SA which is firmly the instigator and catalyst of this gender-relationship-renewal providing

girlfriends, wives and lovers the perfect ‘safe zone’ to reveal to their male counterparts exactly what’s on their mind.

While there was once a time in South Africa’s history where anything pornographic had to be smuggled with more secrecy than narcotics, now SEXPO South Africa has more female visitors than men.

“Men don’t like coming to SEXPO by themselves,” Arthur says with humour, “Usually they won’t come unless they have a girlfriend, wife or partner with them. But the women! They come in packs, massive groups of them and they’ll look at everything and buy the most.”

“There are more products this year than ever before,” Arthur declares, “For both women and for men.”

Ultimately, while the adult industry generates billions of pounds a year and dominates the internet at a rate of five websites to one, it is also one of the most important industries.

While other businesses relate ride movements in economies and stock markets, the waves in the adult industry are directly stimulated by viewership and the desires of people. This being so, it is the industry that provides us with the most honest and upfront reflection of society as a whole.

Interestingly enough the societies that fight the most for gender equality, democracy, gay rights and freedom of speech are also the ones embracing the idea of SEXPO. “Everyone is welcome,” Arthur says, “You should just come and enjoy yourselves.”

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