With yesterday being the last day for the extended Building Expo, several exhibiting companies have expressed their satisfaction with the exposure.
When Stabroek News visited yesterday, a few of the estimated 300 booths had already been cleared out, while there were a number of other businesses present.
Profilbau, a Trinidadian company which was established in Guyana some six months ago and supplies materials such as house mouldings and pipe faucets said that they were grateful for the opportunity to attend the expo since their business is somewhat new to the market. They also said that it was a great opportunity because they had the chance to showcase their ‘yet-to-come’ products.
“We’ve been around in Trinidad for 20 to 25 years, although we’re a Trinidadian company we have an office set up here in Guyana, it is a warehouse… the warehouse was set up in Guyana for about six months… we have the warehouse and items stocked and very soon we’ll be expanding and bringing more stuff.”
A sales representative for Profilbau, Kendell Ramdial, noted, “Well the feedback that we got through this building expo was wonderful and a lot of people embraced our production services. We are looking to supply more and more people. The building expo came in time for us, and this gave us the opportunity to share our products and services what we have available and what we have coming in the future…the expo was basically for advertisement so it could sensitise the population to what we have.”
Mings Products and Services Limited, a decades-old Guyanese company, disclosed that it has partnered with a Canadian company, MST (Maximum Strength) Bar, and used the expo as an opportunity to introduce their new MST bar to the Guyanese construction market.
Speaking with this newspaper, Fazal Azeem, Manager of the Metal Fabrication and Operations Department said, “the expo was basically about brand awareness, and making people know of the product that was our main objective at the expo.”
“We did not have any promotion in our booth but we are here because we are offering a new product to the Guyana market,” he added.
Azeem went on to explain the use of the bar which has been employed in the United States and other places for quite some time. “We have done the comparison with steel to our MST bars and that has attracted almost every person that enters this place here… this MST bar is fibre reinforced with polymer which makes it non corrosive, so at no point in time will it gather any rust so you don’t have to be afraid that it might be exposed to the elements.”
The new MST bar which is two times stronger than steel and quarter the weight of steel, will be sold locally at the company’s warehouse within the next two months.
Meanwhile, Shentec Inc, an American-based company, has been in Guyana for approximately five years and has been supplying designed-sheet-zincs. During the expo, the company was running a promotion offering free delivery service. According to Annie Ramkissoon, the company’s supervisor, anyone who had ordered and paid for materials from the company’s Montrose location, received free delivery during the five days of the Building Expo.
And CMS (Complete Marine Services) Communications Officer, Selena Doodnauth, described the Building Expo as a great opportunity for her St. Lucia-origin company.
“The turnout wasn’t bad at all, we actually gained a lot of potential clients such as other businesses… we met with some guys from China, they want to collaborate with us. We received a lot of outcome, a lot of people took our information, a lot of people want us to contact them.”
CMS had been in Guyana since 2012 and mostly deals with the construction of foundations for houses and commercial buildings. Since being established in Guyana, they have been awarded several large contracts.
Meanwhile, Celina Veersammy of Floor It, The Art of Living, a Guyanese company mentioned that “the expo has been great, we’ve been gaining a lot of recognition and a lot of new potential clients, it has brought a lot of awareness for us on the market.”
Veersammy also disclosed that the company had a promotion during the expo. “We had our vinyl floorings here and what we did was that we had a promotion of $250,000 to be won in the vinyl flooring. The vinyl flooring is a type of flooring that works as a clip-on system… like a puzzle and it could be used over tile, wood or concrete. So the persons just had to like our Facebook page and tag two people and the name was pulled at random. We also had a give-away of two of our imported doors.”
Many recognised Guyanese-based companies were also at the event and they shared that their main aim was to accumulate more market share for the various services and products that they already provide.
