Spanjaard to rebrand Molyslip overseas

Spanjaard Limited, South Africa’s largest manufacturer of specialized lubricants and related chemical products, said it will rebrand as Molyslip in the Asia-Pacific area, in order to gain sales traction.
From 1960 to 1969 the company was the South African distributor of Molyslip products from the U.K. In 1969, Spanjaard purchased outright ownership of the Molyslip brand name for South Africa and a large number of developing countries. Spanjaard Limited has been listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) since 1987.
Chairman Robert Spanjaard said that the Molyslip industrial lubricant brand, which was relaunched in South Africa this year, had been disappointing so far and that it would be marketed instead in Asia-Pacific countries.
Spanjaard launched as a company in 1987, as Molyslip. The Molyslip brand is used in a number of countries, and the brand name was relaunched in South Africa recently. Because it had been a number of years since it was sold and the demographics had shifted, many younger people did not know Molyslip very well, the company said.
Spanjaard would change the marketing strategy for Molyslip in South Africa while marketing Molyslip overseas in about half a dozen countries. Some are in the Asia-Pacific region where the products have done well. In Japan, another company was trading under the same name, which has been sorted out but, ironically, they created brand awareness for the company, Spanjaard said.
The company’s gross profit was consistent with the previous year at 38%. More effective working capital management enabled the company to decrease its non-current and current liabilities, which resulted in a reduced level of borrowings.
Looking ahead, he said Spanjaard had made adjustments so that it would not be harmed by any great volatility in foreign exchange rate, something they learned from the previous financial year.
(May 10, 2013)