Building on SA’s heritage

BUSINESS AND CONSUMERS CAN WORK HAND IN HAND, SAYS GROUP COO ‘We should be proud of the brands founded and built on our own home ground.’

South Africa’s businesses and consumers can work together to build on our heritage for a prosperous future, says Malcolm McDonald, group chief operating officer of the Bravo Group.

Between its sleep and lounge divisions, the group boasts an impressive roll call of 10 renowned household names, ranging from Sealy, Slumberland and Edblo to Grafton Everest, Gommagomma and La-Z-Boy.

“South Africans are very brand conscious and often take pride in displaying the brands that they are using,” he says. “Let’s remind ourselves to be proud of the brands founded and built on our own home ground and that have become integral to our way of life and economic success.”

This subject is close to McDonald’s heart because the Bravo Group traces its own heritage back more than 120 years to the Transvaal Mattress and Furnishings Company, founded in 1895.

This start in the bustling mining town of Joburg burgeoned into an array of furniture and bedding brands that were first listed on the JSE as Afcol in 1964.

“Our business model has made the most of both local and global innovation, manufacturing our own designs alongside international products that we make under licence,” says McDonald. “We believe this delivers the best of both worlds to our customers at the same time as benefitting the South African economy through job creation and skills enhancement.”

The group’s brands have seen many decades of solid growth and creative development.

Edblo, for example, can be traced back 90 years to the foundation of the Edblo Mattress Company founded by Len Edelstein and Barney Bloch. The brand really took off when they were able to add the new Bonnell innersprings from 1945 and by 1950, they were manufacturing nationally.

This year the Bravo Group is also celebrating the half-centenary of local manufacture under licence of US brands Slumberland and Sealy Posturepedic.

Meanwhile, Grafton Everest was formed from the merger of Grafton Art Furnishers and Everest Upholsterers in Durban in 1953. Alpine Lounge followed in 1969 and the iconic Gommagomma in 1988. All now form part of the Bravo Group Lounge Division. This division alone produces the equivalent of 10 000 lounge suites a month.

Their products are sold both in South Africa and around the world.

The Bravo Group’s premium cinema seating is as much at home, for example, in Cinema Privé in South Africa as it is in the Leicester Square cinema where 2 500 movie celebrities and producers regularly gather to view international premieres.

The Bravo Group also recently opened its first North American showroom in Dallas, Texas, where the quality and value of its fullleather chairs, sofas and lounge suites have been welcomed.

The “made in Africa” background of its African Heritage Collection, a range that features exotic leathers such as buffalo and gemsbok, has also been a hit.

Today the Bravo Group runs seven world-class SA manufacturing plants in Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban and surrounds. These factories employ nearly 4 500 people.

“Slumberland SA bedding is today manufactured in the most technologically advanced bedding factory anywhere in the southern hemisphere, for instance,” says McDonald. “That means we are enabling South African customers to take pride in buying locally manufactured, quality products.

“We in turn are also proud that most of the machinery that we use is assembled in South Africa, most of the raw materials that we need are sourced locally as well and, of course, we use our own local designers.

“We contribute to the economy of our country and our region as much as possible. Our group has been building skills for generations in South Africa and we are happy to share this knowledge with enterprises in our neighbouring countries.”

The Bravo Group makes components in South Africa for assembly plants in Zimbabwe and Namibia.

Recently, it also extended the skills development programmes for its own workforce to assist in the Zimbabwean plants.

“We believe our combination of traditional craftsmanship with state-of-the-art product development puts us at the forefront of home furniture manufacture in the region,” says McDonald.