Being a business owner is never easy. Being a business owner in Jamaica requires intestinal fortitude, tenacity, creativity, insight, plus a host of other attributes for manoeuvring through the often treacherous waters of economic instability, inflation and bureaucracy. In short, to say it is not always easy to chart a clear course would be an understatement.
Yet some get it done and make it look easy in the process. One such is Roderick Francis. Raised on good, clean salt air and strong work ethic, Roderick knows all about fishing in Jamaican waters and has fused his knowledge with business savvy to grow the company he inherited from his father ‘Bunny’ Francis. First under the helm of his father, and now currently through his ingenious leadership, B&D Trawling has taken Jamaican seafood to new depths as they seek to make their mark in fisheries, while firmly stamping Jamaica’s dominance in all things seafood.
BUZZZ Magazine caught up with the ever-busy Francis at his Port Royal Street office in order to better see what the company was all about. Buffered by soothing sea breeze plus a picturesque seascape, B&D Trawling was a hive of activity as downtown never truly sleeps, and a fishery business is always one that evokes excitement.
For Francis, filling the business shoes that his father left behind was necessary for the continuity of the company. Luckily for him, his father possessed the foresight of succession planning. “My father in his wisdom had always been training and grooming me since I was a child. I had been working closely with him since college, so we worked together for several years and I got to know the ‘ins and outs’ of the business from him.”
Established in 1980 in east Kingston, the fledging company soon outgrew its location and, through an agreement with the then Government, made the move to downtown Kingston on Port Royal Street. ‘B&D’ stands for Bunny and David (his father’s business partner), and ‘trawling’ refers to a type of fishing where nets are dragged along the ocean’s bottom. However, B&D now only practises eco-friendly fishing methods and not the old-school trawling techniques of yesteryear. Bunny, however, had a love for old trawling boats and apparently made use of the word in the formation of the company.
Over the past thirty-plus years, B&D Trawling has made a name for itself as one of the premier providers of food we expect to see on our plate when invited to feast on aquatic cuisine. Indeed their name is now synonymous with quality seafood, which they provide to the global market at very competitive prices. As Francis puts it, their whole thrust is towards healthy eating. And because Jamaica has some of the best and most pristine waters, this pursuit has been made relatively easy; hence, as people look to enjoy more natural products with no additives, B&D Trawling is seeking to supply that demand.
“Business is great in the sense that the company is doing well and the actual future of Jamaican seafood export is looking bright. We have been partnering with Beaver Street Seafoods, one of the largest distributors in the Unites States, under their Sea Best brand and we are very excited about this for several reasons, namely because of our push to create this import substitution. We import products not currently available in Jamaica and we also package here under the Sea Best Brand. In addition to this, we export to places where Jamaica receives preferential treatment, such as the European Union which gives us preferences under the EPA (Economic Partnership Agreement) agreement. People need to look out for the Sea Best brand. We are pretty much in most supermarkets currently, plus we have also recently opened a retail outlet at 3B Port Royal Street where we offer a wide variety of seafood.”
All of this was made possible because Francis, upon assuming the captaincy of the company, decided that anything worth doing is worth doing to the best of his ability, so he immediately sought to improve on what his father had started by tweaking the operations of the company. He therefore sought to work from the inside out so that all functions would be as seamless as possible, while ensuring that all systems in use were up to standard and could stand up to any present-day testing and inspection.
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