Team Namibia has encouraged all local businesses, irrespective of whether they produce goods or services, to secure their membership in order to benefit from the association with the brand. Founded in 2003, Team Namibia is a member-based non-profit organisation aimed at mobilising Namibian consumers to buy local, as well as promoting the production of quality local products.
Producers and manufacturers are equally prompted to register their products with Team Namibia in order to display the ‘Team Namibia Product’ logo on their wares. This will ensure that they get the necessary exposure through their association with the Team Namibia brand.
Through the efforts of Team Namibia members are likely to benefit from local consumer awareness with the intention to increase their sales volumes and to capture a larger share of the market with access to brand loyal consumers that actively seek out and buy quality Namibian products and services.
Members of Team Namibia also have authorisation to show proof of their membership certificate when bidding or tendering for business, in addition to displaying the ‘Member of Team Namibia’ logo on their stationery and marketing material.
In an economy such as Namibia’s, it is very important for local producers and manufacturers to ensure clear visibility of their products to potential customers in store. Team Namibia offers its members the competitive advantage that comes with displaying their trademarked logo on products produced locally. Producers who want to display the ‘Team Namibia Product’ logo on their products must first receive authorisation to do so. Product code registrations for members is N$100 per code, whereas non-members pay N$20 000 per product code.
Team Namibia also encourages retailers to stock Namibian products and to collaborate with efforts that capacitate local producers to reach market access requirements, which many of the large ones already do through skills and entrepreneurship development initiatives, to meet the requirements of Namibia’s Retail Charter.
In addition, Team Namibia requests retailers to support Team Namibia by encouraging their suppliers to join Team Namibia and carry the trademarked ‘Team Namibia Product’ logo, in order for them to be associated with the national brand that advocates “buying local”. This in turn would resource Team Namibia, which in turn will allow the organisation to build on existing consumer awareness campaigns and stimulate the demand for local products and services, and make it more lucrative for retailers to stock local products.
Bärbel Kirchner, account director at Team Namibia, said: “This will ensure that we build our own capacities and increasingly become self-reliant and ensure our sustainable economic development and employment. We need our products and services to be bought. We might not always be able to compete on price and therefore must work towards levelling the playing field and initially support our own. In this way we can create employment”.
Team Namibia offers retail networking events that connect retailers with producers and manufacturers, with the aim of getting more Namibian products on retailers’ shelves.
Mareka Masule, founder of Ilotu Investments, who recently participated in some Team Namibia activities, said: “Team Namibia has truly been impactful. We have definitely felt the level of respect for our brand increase after adding Team Namibia’s logo to our materials. We definitely do feel even more confident knowing that Team Namibia is a huge part of our backbone when it comes to getting our products to whom they’re needed, more effectively, by organising events such as the recent retail speed dating event that has opened up retailers’ arms to welcoming Ilotu Cosmetics on to their shelves.
We hope that more Namibian business will become a part of the team because a wise man once said that, ‘If you want to reach there quickly, go alone; but if you want to go far, go together’.
“Producers should engage other stakeholders in the economy such as retailers and consumers, most importantly, and work together in the spirit of Uumkumwe (collaboration) to competitively earn shelf space for locally produced goods in supermarkets and corner shops and convenience stores. As a result, it will inspire a strong sense of national pride that arises from sustainably supplying Namibian consumers with Namibian goods and services.”
“It is very important for local producers and service providers to make their products easier to identify as local quality offerings in the market place,” Masule added.