Water and energy solutions provider, Davis & Shirtliff, is a well-established brand in the East Africa region and is known for providing high quality products that are readily available and at competitive prices. Recently, we caught up with the firm’s Head of Marketing, Josfrider Musima, to find out more about Davis & Shirtliff one of the Most Outstanding Water Equipment Suppliers in East Africa today.
Established in 1946, Davis & Shirtliff Group is the leading supplier of water and energy related equipment in the area. The organisation regionally distributes high-quality equipment sourced from a number of industry leading companies from around the world as well as carrying out distribution, manufacture and assembly of various water related products under its own brand Dayliff.
Business activities are focused around seven product segments – Water Pumps, Boreholes, Swimming Pools, Water Treatment, Irrigation, Generators and Solar Equipment.
The Group is Kenya based and the Nairobi headquarters cover an area of 10,000m2, with extensive warehousing, manufacturing, training and administrative facilities from where products are efficiently distributed by the company’s own fleet of trucks. The firm also operates through a network of Kenyan branches as well as regional subsidiaries in Uganda, Tanzania, Zambia, Rwanda, South Sudan, DRC, Zimbabwe and an associate company in Ethiopia.
Josfrider Musima is Head of Marketing at Davis & Shirtliff. To begin, she goes into great detail about the firm’s mission and objectives.
Josfrider elaborates to further explain that the firm’s key focus to simultaneously develop the business across all activity areas to ensure that no areas of weakness can potentially diminish organizational capacity.
“Customer relationships are also very important to us,” she highlights. “The quality focus has built great confidence in the brand which has created an excellent market reputation.”
With a total complement of more than 800 highly trained and professional staff, Davis & Shirtliff lays great emphasis on having the right people in terms of intellectual capacity, skillsets and commitment. A combination of careful recruitment, culture, remuneration, training and openness are embedded in the management philosophy as staff are the front face of the organisation and oversee the building and maintaining of customer relations. “Our customers are vast and varied and include homeowners, organisations, industries, Government institutions etc. We approach potential customers predominantly through advertising, but also word-of-mouth referrals and by directly approaching some prospective customers.”
Giving back to local communities has been a commitment of Davis & Shirtliff since its founding in 1946. Through Corporate Social Responsibility, it helps solve some of the most pressing challenges and unlock the potential of communities.
“Davis and Shirtliff is converging people, technology and resources to improve lives in Africa through cooperation and a resolve to find sustainable solutions to existing challenges,” says Josfrider. “We continue to deploy millions of shillings in both resources and time to address these challenges. Our goal is to achieve real impact on people, the communities they live in, the society and ultimately our planet to preserve it for future generations.”
Regarding the future, Josfrider tells us that, operationally, the focus will continue to be on the support functions of the supply chain and systems, both of which are so essential in a widely dispersed distribution business, and are areas of considerable competitive advantage, as they are difficult for competitors to replicate.
“As we move forward, technology is also a key area of focus as the world continues to change. Davis & Shirtliff is at the forefront in ensuring that it continues to embrace technology, adapting and changing often to cater for customers changing needs and preferences.”