Star South is by no means the largest fresh fruit provider based in South Africa, but the size of the competition is part of the reason for Star South’s success. Star South’s unique culture of personalization and commitment to producer and purchaser cannot be replicated in larger companies. The collaborative and competitive culture at Star South is the “house” that Managing Director Jaco Rheeder has built.

It would certainly be hard to find anyone as passionate for competition as Jaco.  He rode top amateur bicycles races at the South African national level from 2005 through 2012, winning at least 30 individual events, and placing 74th as a part of the 2005 Cape Epic team. He accumulated accolades for his leadership of the Anderson Transport racing team that won the Coronation Double Century Cycle Challenge in 2009.

Jaco is a winner in all things he attempts, and the competition underestimates him at their economic peril. At Star South Jaco’s leadership has resulted in high levels of confidence on the part of the purchaser; they know that the delivered product meets every specifications wherever delivered. This First World standard, matched to a culture of personal responsibility extending from the boardroom to the cold-room floor, makes Star South the first choice of clients such as Spar and Shoprite, and in turn produces the buying confidence of European Category Managers for companies such as Albert Heijn  and Lidl. The grower shares the benefits of this Star South culture through prompt payments, fewer rejections, and reputational enhancement each time the shipment meets or exceeds order specifications. Star South delivers this result for the grower.

Leadership is not for the faint of spirit at Star South. The company is a partnership of four high performing fruit and vegetable import/export agents. A literal “team of equals” with each partner covering a geographic zone and a series of growers & products. The leadership challenges are the stuff of horror movies. The products must yield to Mother Nature who has her say, the food standard inspectors of Star South, the occasional high seas pirate, and then the port authorities and purchaser agents.

Through it all the team relies upon Jaco to guide it year after year to match or beat its volume and income targets. The success is aided by innovations Jaco forced upon somewhat technology resistant partners and staff including the use of Microsoft Dynamics Nav, SharePoint, and LinkFresh enterprise resource planning software systems that allow real-time measurement and management of each step in the process from the producer to purchaser. Each partner and team member is more prodcutive as the software provides instant access to data, including the credentials of the producer and the requirements of the purchaser. Jaco is responsible for imposing upon the technicians a functional and practical system architecture, with user customization, easy implementation, and team training. Other innovations resulted in year upon year improvement of credit risk losses, reduced spoilage in transportation, fewer returns or rejections, and increasing overall customer satisfaction and confidence. These innovations resulted in the sales per customer increasing annually in double digits even during the global pandemic recession.

This company as one to watch for growth as integration occurs throughout the “field to customer” chain. Already, Star South is innovating with “just-in-time delivery” using technologies enabling customer automated ordering direct from the coldroom, and a fleet of satellite tracked small format refrigerated vehicles to shuttle specific orders from coldroom to the local client distribution center warehouse. Automated invoicing based upon QR Code tracking of delivered orders further streamlines the more routine functions of the delivery system. The addition of an overseas order processing center for better coordination across cultures, the use of institutional financing of generous customer and grower financial packages, and the constant attention to the personal aspects of the vendor relationships are all coordinated to assure customer satisfaction. Expect to see Star South, which has grown to over 200 direct employees, add a skills enhancement program and training program to nurture its future trading floor leaders, and seek to partner with empowerment engines dedicated to uplift of the previously disadvantaged community.

For more information, visit the Star South site online.