COVID-19 prompts business expansion - Pest control start-up adds cleaning service, eyes foreign markets

ZAYIN PEST Solutions is an example of a company repurposing and refocusing during a health and economic disaster to take advantage of emerging opportunities, even as its traditional area of business activity takes a beating.

The year-old start-up does pest control, indcluding termites, for homes, businesses and construction sites until the COVID-19 pandemic dealt a severe blow to the business.

Regular clients and prospective commercial customers have shuttered their doors, construction activity has effectively ground to a halt, and homeowners are deferring pest control treatment; and, in the era of social distancing, are putting off having visitors in their homes.

But with the health emergency, the need for heavy-duty deep cleaning and sanitisation loomed large and business owner Jodie McAnuff wasn’t about to let an opportunity go to waste. The cleaning of homes, offices, stores, restaurants and other commercial spaces with steam or a disinfecting mist is now the primary focus of the business.

A lull in this new activity occasioned by the temporary lockdown of the parish of St Catherine, where the business is based, has provided the entrepreneur with time to fine-tune plans for expansion into other Caribbean countries when border restrictions are lifted.

“It wasn’t difficult to add this new component. It was just to get the equipment and materials to do so, and arrange some training of staff,” McAnuff said of the transition to the cleaning service.

While the virus spread occurred in other countries over the past few months, steamers, mist blowers, protective gear and other equipment were imported, and spray solutions procured in Jamaica, as the business prepared for the possible economic disruption and entry into the new service.

“We haven’t run into any roadblocks in terms of the availability of the raw materials and inputs as yet, so we will see how that goes,” she told the Financial Gleaner.

The financing required for the new area of operation ran into “a few hundred thousand dollars,” the entrepreneur said of the additional capital outlay, which came from the reinvestment of revenues. Restaurants, offices and villas still in operation, as well as eateries, schools and other business places preparing for reopening, have been the main customers of the sanitising service so far, allowing Zayin Pest Solutions to retain its five employees who are said to have been trained and certified by the Pesticides Control Authority.

“People are not necessarily rushing to do sterilisation right now, but the demand for the service is steadily growing,” McAnuff says of the state of the market. Like many other small businesses, the pest control and cleaning company has upped its presence on social media with active engagement of clients and prospective clients, particularly through Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp.

With its operations based in Portmore, the business is again facing setback as a result of the government-imposed lockdown of St Catherine following the mushrooming of COVID-19-positive cases at a call centre in Portmore in the parish. McAnuff notes that the ban on movement, though necessary to contain the virus spread, was having a negative toll on the business. She has already slashed monthly revenue forecasts and is concerned about the image of the company among existing clients, as contracted jobs have had to be postponed or cancelled. Many of her workers live in Portmore and are unable to honour cleaning and pest control commitments.

Some business is still possible during the period as Zayin Pest Solutions maintains a small operation out of Duncans in the parish of Trelawny, the home town of the business owner. The major drawbacks, however, are the inability to redeploy staff, equipment and supplies, as well as difficulty to hire trained and certified workers at short notice.

Even with the new hurdle, McAnuff, the sole director and chief executive of the limited liability company, is not dismayed. She is expressing confidence that the business will be able to withstand the current shocks and do well in the long run, including setting up shop in a few nearby Caribbean countries. She is already exploring partnerships in Cayman Islands and The Bahamas.

“With struggle comes progress. The lockdown will give us time to further refocus the business,” McAnuff says with optimism.

She is hopeful that the enterprise will regain the momentum it had picked up before the pandemic when Zayin Pest Solutions had contracts for regular spraying of restaurants, supermarkets, wholesale, hotels and villas. The buoyant construction industry also provided many preconstruction termite control jobs.

Before venturing into pest control, McAnuff worked in construction as a director at Momentum Finishers Limited, based in Trelawny. She has maintained connection with several construction companies, which have provided a steady flow on work for the pest control side of the business.

huntley.medley@gleanerjm.com