The First Few Days

Day One

What a start!!

Over weight luggage (Geoff "I have a 1980's video camera the size of a baby hippo/walkabout ' Poland), an empty flight (Michael 'plenty of leg room for me thank you very much' Bradfield), about 3 hours sleep (combined), an electric shock (Sarah 'don't stand too close to the lions' cage' Poolman), a dead camera battery after 9 pictures (Steff ' have you ever used a charger?' Thomas) and a professional photographer to document our trip (Natasha 'David Bailey' Murray).

But what a welcome!!

Smiling faces, warm handshakes, fabulous food, great game drive and a beautiful braai.

Day Two involved an early start again with a visit to the Mercedes Benz factory to see the C Class being built. We were then whisked away to Isaiah 58, in Parkside, a home/school for orphans and abandoned children to see the inspirational work that Rotary are undertaking.

The experience then lead us to 'Workbench', a sheltered employment centre for people with mental and physical disabilities, where they are assembling re-hydration spoon packs, Helen Batting's brainchild. Please see web link.
http://www.spoonofhope.co.za/

From there we moved on to Duncan Village Day Centre, a health clinic that services a poverty stricken settlement, near to East London city centre. In the afternoon we were taken on a township tour of Duncan Village and Mdantsane, stopping off at Mrs Zamani's creche, the controversial Duncan Village memorial and a shebeen (an informal tavern in the settlements).The afternoon finished on a lively note when we witnessed a mini-van/taxi overturn due to a trainee's misjudgement and a car chase through a busy mall car park. Adventure all the way!!!

The day concluded with fantastic home hosting by a variety of Rotarians. Very enjoyable.

Day Three

Vocational Day! (and a 6am beach/swim excursion for Sarah and Steff - we have pictures to prove it). Geoff decided to merely take the dog for a walk with Helen Batting on the beach! He chose to ignore the opportunity of the dog-walking service. Mike was also up before six, although due to the enthusiasm of Hutch's two dogs (Chelsea and Delilah) rather than by choice.


Sarah - out on patrol with DI Rudi van Dyk, from the child abuse and rape division of SAPS
Michael -spending the day at Frere Hospital & Alderson Ambulance Service, East London
Steff - visit to University of Fort Hare, Alice to discuss educational funding and practices
Geoff - day with National Finance Brokers
Natasha - recovering with some retail therapy, whilst the rest of us did some work!



Natasha - I was privileged to spend the morning with Rotarian Gotz Van Westernhagen at the offices of his business, The V W Group. Gotz has spent the last 15 years building his retail business that now consists of many operations including 7 Spar Franchises, a US Import operation, manufacturing businesses (including his own diary that supplies his stores with milk and yoghurt) and a transport and distribution operation.

It was great to be able to to spend time with him talking about both the benefits and limitations of trading in South Africa and having the opportunity for 2 retailers to compare notes on the way each of us trade.

Gotz then handed me over to his right hand woman, Risna, who has many years retail experience working for 3 major SA retailers, who joined Gotz's team a couple of years ago as his HR and Training Manager.

We started with an in depth tour of the Gonubie store where I had the great opportunity to see not only the customer side of the business but to go behind the scenes and experience the back of house operation, which in comparison to the retail I am used to was extraordinary. In the UK, most retailers source goods that are ready for the customer. Very little "manufacturing" is done on individual retail sites. In the UK the products are either made by the business at a central location and then distributed out to individual stores or purchased from external suppliers and manufacturers as a finished product and then distributed to stores for re sale. Gotz's operation however sees the production of a huge % of fresh foods in each of his stores each and every day.

Each store has a scratch bakery meaning all bread based products (except the 12 or so pre packed sliced loaves) are all freshly baked from scratch by bakers every day. Confectioners spend each day preparing some fantastic cakes, bakes, tarts and treats from scratch each day.

The fresh offer also includes a huge range of cooked meals and accompaniments, all prepared fresh in store each day. A very large selection of salads and and puddings are also prepared fresh in store every day by trained staff.

Many factors contribute to the decline of this amount of fresh product being produced on site by UK retailers, including the cost of retail space, staff costs, training costs and equipment costs. The effective supply chains and distribution in the UK has also lead to the increase in centralised production locations.

I was given the opportunity to see many different retail offers depending on the suburb they were located in, ranging from stores that sell a large % of imported goods mainly from the US, supplying premium products with premium price tags all the way through the spectrum to stores that sold a large amount of bulk products - such as 10kg rice, 10kg sugar and flour and 10 litre vegetable oil, the staples foods of the Xhosa diet.

I had an absolutely fantastic day and I owe a huge thank you to Gotz, Risna and the team at all the Spars I visited for a thoroughly enjoyable and educational day.

The evening had more fun in store for us with our first presentation at East London Golf Club.

Three days in, fantastic people, very hospitable hosts, beautiful scenery, eye opening and emotional experiences and very little sleep. More of the same please!