Arandis
The defunct Arandis clothing factory, Dantago Clothing will soon be a source of income again to many of the town’s residents who were left jobless when the company closed its doors in January last year.
The CEO of Arandis Town Council, Florida Husselman announced on Friday morning during the opening of the third Arandis Investors Conference and Uranium Festival that plans are currently underway to revive the factory.
She added that all negotiations are at an advanced stage, although the full details regarding the re-opening of the factory are still not known.
The once-flourishing clothing factory used to employ around 450 people, mostly women, and stood for years as the backbone and lifeline of many households in the small mining town.
Since the closure of the factory in January 2014, the employees have struggled to secure decent jobs. It is understood that only 20 percent of its former employees could secure jobs on the mines, while others moved away in search for jobs. The rest are still struggling to find work.
Dantago Clothing supplied clothing to the mines and retail giants, such as the South African supermarket group, Woolworths, which it supplied for about nine years. However, the contract with Dantago Clothing ended when Woolworths implemented a process to buy back all its Southern African Development Community (SADC) franchises, as part of restructuring its business model on the continent.
Dantago sewed the garments at its Arandis factory and then transported the garments to Woolworths in South Africa for distribution among the latter’s many retail stores throughout Africa.
When they failed to secure jobs some of Dantago’s former employees resorted to making clothes on their own to sell in the local community, as well as nearby towns, such as Usakos and Swakopmund.