Wisynco launches big recruitment drive in countdown to August

Manufacturing and distribution company Wisynco Group is looking towards August to wrap up the current multibillion-dollar expansion programme but has already put a new production line into operation.

It has also launched a big recruitment drive, seeking to fill around 600 vacancies.

Chairman William Mahfood said the new high-speed filler machine, referred to as Line Five, was commissioned at Wisynco’s White Marl complex in St Catherine just before Christmas, just in time to produce additional volumes and variety to meet demand in peak season.

“That line is fully operational and it’s really doing big numbers already, so we’re seeing the effects of that in terms of supplies.,” Mahfood told the Financial Gleaner.

Wisynco suffered from production constraints in November and December 2023, which were eased somewhat by the commissioning of the new line, according to Mahfood.

The company ended up growing its top line by nearly one-tenth in the full quarter, October to December, but the production constraints which limited supplies to the market at the advent of the crucial shopping season ended up putting a drag on the company’s margins and bottom line.

Revenue improved by 9.3 per cent, but net profit was flat at nearly $1.22 billion.

St Catherine-based Wisynco is a manufacturers of beverages and bottler of Coca-Cola’s products in Jamaica. It also produces its own beverage brands, inclusive of Wata water and flavoured waters and Bigga soft drinks; while as a distributor, it handles a large portfolio of Jamaican and foreign consumer items under contract.

Mahfood says the expansion programme and the concomitant introduction of new production lines should go a far way in boosting production, to keep pace with market demand and allow the company to do more exports.

The budget for the overall expansion project stands at nearly US$32 million, or about $5 billion. There have been some upward variations wrought by delays in the delivery of project-related inputs that the company ordered, Mahfood said.

The $5 billion is in line with the initial estimate advanced by Wisynco when it announced the rollout of the expansion programme in 2022.

A new water line at the company’s Lakes Pen facility is almost complete, according to Mahfood. He expects that it will be fully commissioned within two weeks.

“That line is going to double our capacity on the water side, where we had a lot of challenges last year in meeting customers’ needs,” Mahfood said.

A third filling line, dubbed Line Six, will also be installed at White Marl. Wisynco will be retrofitting the space once used for styrofoam production for the new line, which Mahfood anticipates will be installed by April.

Wisynco presently operates from twin campuses at White Marl and Lakes Pen in St Catherine. The company’s footprint covers 600,000 square feet. That will grow to 800,000 square feet of operating space once the project is complete, Mahfood said.

The additions include 180,000 square feet in new space at Lakes Pen with a 20,000-square-foot mezzanine.

“We had originally thought it would come on stream by the end of our financial year in June, but it is looking more like July-August for that part of the project,” the chairman said, reiterating that the new factory will push Wisynco to the next level in terms of innovation and packaging, using glass and aluminium.

Wisynco is currently recruiting workers for the larger operation, having recently put out two full pages of advertising to fill a range of positions. Mahfood says the company started hunting workers in November but has had to accelerate the hiring programme to fill 500-600 clear vacancies, adding to the present cohort of 2,100.

“We’re hiring in anticipation of some of the new business that we expect to come; we’re looking for production people, sales and marketing, and a whole host of others to cover the new job positions that will be created,” he said.

neville.graham@gleanerjm.com