The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The Bahamas Telecommunications Company (BTC) yesterday said its franchise store roll-out will have created 100-120 jobs by year-end, with another three locations set to open by October.

Marlon Johnson, BTC’s senior vice-president of marketing and communications, told Tribune Business that the carrier was now gearing up to launch its first in-store retail location in New Providence before Christmas.

Reiterating that BTC was targeting a 20-25 strong franchise network, split between standalone sites and in-store concepts, Mr Johnson said that when added to the carrier’s 10 wholly-owned locations, nationwide coverage would extend to around 35 stores.

“We’re fairly advanced with that,” Mr Johnson told Tribune Business of the store roll-out. “We anticipate that by the time we get through the year, we will have added another 100-120 jobs in the retail franchise footprint alone, and are pretty confident that by the time we’re done that number will exceed 200.”

And he added: “Within the last five years we’ve opened up close to 10 new franchise locations, and by the time we get to October we will be up to another two or three more.

“Our retail roll-out programme is performing well, the new stores are performing to expectation, and the ones at Prince Charles Drive and Harbour Bay are leading the charge.”

Mr Johnson emphasised that the existing franchise stores were “meeting our expectations, and are where they are expected to be at this juncture”, as BTC and its franchisees moved to gain customer acceptance of retail network.

“Customers are getting comfortable with the idea of paying there, getting superior service and everything they get at BTC,” he added.

Mr Johnson said BTC was targeting 20-25 franchise stores, via a mixture of standalone and in-store locations.

“We’re looking at store-in-store concepts,” he confirmed to Tribune Business.

“Before Christmas we will be rolling out at least the first one. The first one, I suspect, will be in New Providence, but we are also talking to small Family Island communities where the customer base may be small, and the location is under-served.”

Mr Johnson said BTC’s proposed in-store concept was likely tailor-made for such communities, where it could be located within existing locations such as grocery outlets.

And BTC was also looking to establish in-store locations within existing retail establishments on New Providence and Grand Bahama.

“If you add all of them together,” Mr Johnson said of the franchise locations, “the target is 25 of those, and combined with BTC’s own locations, there will be approximately 30-35 in total.”

BTC previously said its retail roll-out would inject some $3-$5 million in direct construction costs into the Bahamian economy, and another $1–$3 million in ancillary services and supplies.