And now the fourth generation is set to grow company further...

With the fourth generation of the Herholdt family now part of the business that Faan Herholdt built way back in the Thirties, the dynasty seems fairly safe. For young Pieter Herholdt, the son of Director Piet Herholdt is now very much a part of the family business, and clearly set for bigger things.

Pieter was born in 1987 in Colesberg and on finishing school enrolled at Stellenbosch in 2006 in order to pursue a BA in Informatics. When he achieved his BA in 2008 he immediately set bout acquiring his Honours in Informatics. “I simultaneously started work on getting an IT Project Management professional certification through CompTIA,” explained Pieter.

“I completed these studies in 2009 and immediately joined Herholdt’s full time.” But of course, he was very familiar with the company having grown up within its environment and soaked up its culture. “From the age of 15 onwards I have worked in one or other of its outlets on Saturdays and over the December Christmas holidays. So there was no culture shock for me when I joined full time last year,” he revealed.

Initially, Pieter was put through the mill to learn as much as he could about the various aspects of the business. “My first job mainly involved doing deliveries; thereafter I was shunted through different departments and even assisted with sales. It was all about me getting as much hands on experience as possible. However, as I gained the experience, I was placed into more senior positions and today I am mainly concerned with sales,” he said.

Young though Pieter may be, he is very conscious of the critical importance of Herholdt’s image with its customers and the public at large. “This image has been built up over many years and is very important to the company. Basically, it revolves around service. For us the customer is the central focus of everything we do. Hence they are the most important entity in our organisation.

“So our staff from their very first day of employment, have that drummed into them. They are never allowed to forget that that is the reason why they are there, “ he stated emphatically. “But also as the family, we never allow ourselves to forget that happy customers are only part of our success. The other significant part is the quality of our employees.

“And Herholdt recognises and values its employees. This market we trade in is extremely competitive and unless we attract and keep the right calibre employee we will never succeed. I would say that the importance of human resources in this organisation can never be over-emphasised. So Herholdt is constantly on the lookout for quality employees with potential. And it goes without saying that we offer very competitive remuneration packages,” emphasised Pieter.

He believes his particular strengths are suited to his ambitions for Herholdt. “At the moment I am still garnering as much experience and exposure to retail as possible. So I am concentrating on my immediate daily challenges. However, once I feel I understand this industry a lot better and have got considerably more experience, I will be on the lookout for new opportunities.

“ These could be in terms of expansion, maybe in terms of diversifying, who knows? But what I do know is that my qualifications have given me certain competitive advantages in this organisation. I want to introduce some of the things I have learned, some of the principles, for the improvement of our business. For example in the field of information systems and knowledge management I have a lot to offer.

“One of the key challenges for me,” concluded Pieter Herholdt, “is to help raise this organisation’s performance on to a higher level. I believe I can make a valuable contribution in this regard by generating the momentum to perform at an optimal level.”