MANAGING DIRECTOR, ESCARGOT CC

1993-1996 MANAGING DIRECTOR ESCARGOT CC, KLAPMUTS-SOUTH AFRICA

My endeavours to find a suitable financier for setting up a private commercial company for breeding, processing and marketing snails and snail-products in South Africa, had been successful and consequently a company called ESCARGOT PRODUCTION VENTURES CC (Reg : 94/ 02437/23) was initiated. I acquired a 40 % interest in this Closed Corporation.

Initially I was appointed Production Manager, but took on the marketing responsibilities on a later stage as well. Managing these responsibilities put me virtually in the position of Managing Director, being accountable only to the financiers.

As you can find here under, my responsibilities in this venture has been diverse. They can be organized into seven categories.

Design, development, construction and management of sophisticated indoor snail farming and processing facilities
Management of snail collection programs
Design and development of outdoor farming facilities for franchising purposes
Development and production of fresh and frozen snail food products for local and foreign markets.
Marketing ESCARGOT-products on the local and international markets.
Management of current accounts and attracting additional finances.
Training and management of personnel.

1. Design, development, construction and management of highly sophisticated indoor snail farming and processing facilities

ESCARGOT CC is the first company in South Africa with a commercial indoor breeding unit for snails. This know-how was purchased from the University of Stellenbosch, were I managed the research project in this field. To help your imagination, the indoor production of snails is highly sophisticated, with the culture rooms looking more like a laboratory than a farm. Temperature, humidity, ventilation and light need to be tightly controlled. Therefor, I had to design corrosion free culture rooms with automatically controlled (timer-board) air-conditioning, misters, ventilation and lighting. The construction of these facilities were conducted under my direction. All the other breeding infrastructure for the three main stages of the culture (Reproduction, Nursery, Fattening) had to be specially designed and build. All this work was finalized under my direction as well. I also had to train and supervise five labourers to maintain this breeding culture which requires continuous hygienic conditions to prevent introduction of wild snails, predators, parasites and diseases.
As ESCARGOT CC is breeding with a foreign species of snails, these breeding facilities needed the approval of the Department of Plant and Quality Control, seeking to prevent an outbreak of a major snail-pest. They were so impressed with the professional approach of our set-up, that our method is currently being used as a standard for anybody in South Africa who intends breeding snails (and there are many entrepreneurs interested doing so).

2. Management of snail collection programs

Not only cultured snails (Gros Gris) are being used in ESCARGOT products, but we also purchase snails that are collected by farmers and individuals (Petit Gris). I designed a pamflet to make people realize that they could turn their pest into a profit. Special facilities to clean out the snail's intestines (purging) were designed and build. Collected snails are slaughtered the same way as the cultured ones.

3. Design and development of outdoor farming facilities for franchising purposes

Following the enthusiastic response on one of our articles in a popular magazine (Country Life ), we realized the potential of entrepreneurs farming local snails outdoor. I established contact in Belgium with the largest importers of snail meat in Europe, and managed a contract binding them to buy an unlimited amount of snail meat of this particular snail species (Petit Gris). This opened the door for the concept of franchising outdoor snail farming ventures to entrepreneurs, to produce the slaughtered snails in frozen bulk packs. ESCARGOT would then only have to trade these products to its European customer.
I compiled a complete manual for the construction and managing of an outdoor farming and processing unit for snails. Currently three projects country wide, have been initiated as a result hereof.

4. Development and production of fresh and frozen food products containing snails for local and foreign catering- and retail markets.

After having grown snails to a commercial size, the second step of the production consists in slaughtering the live harvested or collected snails. The abattoir contains facilities to de-slime, cook (conventional gas cookers) and select the snails. All these steps are carried out manually.

On a later stage, a third species (Achatina) from foreign origin, was introduced into our products. Those snails were processed directly from the tins that were purchased from importers. I established the contacts in the Far East, for in the event the company has enough cash to import them directly.

The third step of the production involves the processing of the slaughtered snails into a range of products containing snails.
Before processing the snails into the marketable products, the slaughtered snails are subject to a second cooking in a vegetable and herb brine adding to their flavour. This process produces low processed snails. The low processed snails are then further processed into 'finished' high processed snail products.

Here you can find an overview of ESCARGOT SNAIL PRODUCTS.

The processing area consists of a 'kitchen' of 6 x 12 m, a large refrigerated room and a medium sized freezer room.
The sauces are made with heavy mixers that can handle these stiff batters, and are applied manually with 'cream dispensers' as used to top cakes in bakeries. All the cooking is done on conventional gas cookers.
In order to be able to market our products overseas, I needed to design and manage this processing facility complying to the strictest EEC and FDA (US) food processing regulations. 'EEC Council Directive 91/493/EEC, laying down the health conditions for the production and placing on the market of fishery products' was used as a guideline in this endeavour. This directive was advised for reference, as no legislation for processing snails exists up to date. Consequently, ESCARGOT's processing facilities received a South African Health Certificate from the Environmental Health Officer of the Cape Metropolitan Council, finding them complying with the applicable Health Legislation.
Ongoing quality control was based on the ISO 9002 (1994) guidelines for quality control (ICS : 03.120.10).

5. Marketing ESCARGOT-products on the local and international markets.

The final step involved the marketing and distribution of the products. With this information, a marketing plan was formulated.
The catering markets as well as the retail markets, locally and overseas, were targeted from the start.
The local catering market was our first target with the ESCARGOT CONVENIENCE SIXPACK. Encouraging sales are being produced in this highly competitive market. Food distributors are used to trade and distribute the products to the restaurants in all parts of the country.
With the development of the ESCARGOT SNAIL TRAY and the ESCARGOT REFILL, we had the products to aim at a niche in the retail market. ESCARGOT got into business with a marketing company that is currently, successfully, marketing and merchandising the retail products to mayor retail chains in South Africa (Pick&Pay, Hyperama, OK-Bazaars, Checkers&Shoprite, Spar).
We realized that the South African market was not large enough to allow future growth. Therefore a lot of attention was given, from the start, to marketing the products overseas. I sent frozen samples to a couple of counties including the US (Florida), Canada (Montreal), the UK and Belgium. A trade mission to the US was conducted, yielding customers who we are about to export to. An European customer was found for the Petit Gris snails. Exports were scheduled for September '96. I established the cost and nature of export freight channels, received the necessary legislation and permits to export the frozen products to the EEC an the US.
As part of the publicity drive, I organized a stand at the exhibition FISH AFRICA '95 in Cape Town, sharing a booth with The EUROPEAN FISH CENTRE in Zeebrugge (Belgium) which I represented for the occasion.Four publications; Argus (Cape), Professional Catering, Food Review and Country Life exposed our unique products to the South African public. A set of 6 varieties (3 types of snails and 2 sauces) of the ESCARGOT CONVENIENCE SIXPACK was entered for the FOOD REVIEW New Product Competition. The products were prepared for tasting by a panel of 5 judges. The article reads: 'Even those judges who weren't over enthusiastic about snails in general admitted that this product has many important elements for success : convenience, added value and a good taste profile.'

6. Management of current accounts and attracting additional finances.

As part of the daily running of this venture, I managed the current accounts : debtors and creditors. I organized all the buying of imported snails and ingredients required for a often busy production line.
All the larger financial aspects of the CC were orchestrated in team by the Board of Directors. Due to a lack of funding for expansion, I managed an ongoing search for additional investment. In these efforts, I compiled all the necessary prospectus and budget-study documents. I also went overseas (Belgium) to approach interested financiers.

7. Training and management of personnel.

In my function of M.D., I was also directly responsible for the training and management of 15 heads personnel. No Unions were involved.