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SOUTH AFRICA
From left to right John Laskarides (Shareholder & CEO of Bandag SA), Tony Kalis (Shareholder) and Renier Botha (Managing Director) during 20th Anniversary Celebrations
that the oldest tyre factory of Bridgestone/Firestone decided to close down its factory in Port Elizabeth.
The shrinking South African economy and weakening of the ZAR coupled with the importers’ struggle to get their products out of China and the emergence of the Coronavirus pandemic, has unfortunately set many retreaders back, resulting in a very competitive and price sensitive market. Botha, however, remains resolute.
“Our customers are now returning to the quality and value that a Bandag retread can offer them. And we believe that the pandemic was in many ways a great equalizer in that it affected ever yone the same. We are very conscious of the challenges facing businesses including ours, due to the high unemployment rate, high liquidation rates of businesses and the struggles faced by previously disadvantaged
businesses and people.
“We went out of our way, and at great expense and risk to our business, to pay all our employees their full wages and salaries during the lockdown period. We see motivated, loyal employees as our biggest asset, and they were instrumental in getting us back to being fully operational. We have a policy to promote from within and we spend time and effort on training and motivating our team. We don’t want them to become part of the statistics,” Botha said.
For him, the vulnerability of the South African tyre market to Chinese imports, the impacts
of Covid-19 lockdowns and the difficulty in getting casings, especially in certain sizes, are a great deal to worr y about. But in all, he strongly maintains a ver y positive outlook for the future of retreading in South Africa.