Jacden Enterprises pivoting,
Company invests heavily in sanitising products, staff training, garment production
Vitaloxide, a United States Environmental Protection Agency-registered hospital disinfectant cleaner, mould killer, and odour eliminator.
According to Williams, the chemical kills 99.99 per cent of all airborne bacterial viruses — including SARS-COV-2, the strain of coronavirus that causes the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
“We did the research and found that this thing was very effective and better than bleach. Bleach, once it dries, becomes inactive. But this product, when it dries on a surface, up to 14 days after when you wipe the surface again it reactivates, because it leaves a protective barrier. When we clean, we not only just wipe surfaces, we use a heat process with the sanitisers, and the final step is to fumigate the facility with Vitaloxide,” Williams told Observer Sunday Finance.
“It’s not a cheap product but it is effective, and we have decided that we are going to use it – as expensive as it is – in our process because it gives a higher level of protection,” he continued. He disclosed that the company spent over $9 million in acquiring this product.
“Because of COVID-19 the scope of work has changed, you have to be wiping more often and it requires more staff. We recently secured a contract for sanitising for the Jamaica Customs Agency right across the island…so I would say it’s paying off,” he said.
While Jacden currently employs close to 1,000 people within the group with the janitorial services accounting for around 800, Williams said it also invests heavily in technology – namely foggers, misting machines and heat treatment machines.
Despite the uptick in its janitorial and sanitation services, Willams said the company faces challenges in finding qualified people. To this end, it has decided to officially develop its training programme.
“Cleaning and sanitation is not something that you can take lightly; it is a very technical and exacting process if it’s going to be done properly. Over time we have had a training programme but we are stepping up, and we have now initiated discussions with a tertiary institution that will host that training programme for us so that people can get certified by an accredited institution,” the president said.
He further asserted that customer service is integral to not only the company’s operations but to its foundation, and that its quality of work speaks for itself.
“Our slogan is ‘Customer satisfaction is our business’, and we take that seriously. We clean from a pin to an anchor. We’re in business but we are conscious of the fact that money is not the driving force. If you satisfy your clients, the money will come. So we don’t approach a job just because of the financial returns but we believe that once the customer is satisfied, the returns will come,” he said.
He added that the satisfied customer then becomes its major advertising platform.
While the core function of the company is janitorial and sanitation services, when it was established 12 years ago Jacden started with construction. It is now a grade 2 contractor registered with the National Contracts Commission that spans a gamut of roads, housing, civil construction, and electrical works.
“We have built some homes for the National Housing Trust, and we were a part of the group of contractors