A local entrepreneur has questioned the marketing strategy employed to entice local investors to buy
shares in the Wadadli brewery located at Crabbs Peninsula.
At the Prime Minister’s Business Forum on Tuesday, marketing and communications Elijah James said the communication strategy adopted by German-based brewery, BREWTECH Antigua Limited, to have local entrepreneurs involved in the company – dormant for almost a decade – was ineffective.
“In the paper, there was a headline about not being able to find local investors for the brewery. Now…as a person in marketing and communication, I never saw an ad or any promotions asking about shares in ventures like that.
“So I want to posit to you that whatever the means these local or foreign investors are going about trying to connect with entrepreneurs, it needs to be fixed…We need to know about the opportunities so we can invest in them,” he said.
As reported on Monday, the Prime Minister’s Chief of Staff, Lionel “Max” Hurst, said BREWTECH Antigua Limited has had a difficult time finding local investors.
Hurst, at the time, stated that the government was considering regional offers for investment in the brewery, particularly from a Barbadian brewery company.
It was only in August 2018 that the manager of BREWTECH, Jobst Meier Zu Biesen, called on Antiguans to invest in the company through the buying of shares.
He said then that if there were no local investors, then they (BREWTECH) would be forced to run the entire operation themselves.