(From left to right) Bernard, Jacqueline and Richard

Two years after it came into existence, the Trois Frères Distillery – producer of Takamaka Bay rum – has known much success among locals and is now eyeing the European market in its first bold attempt towards export.

If all goes well, according to the owners of the company, the first consignment of Takamaka Bay rums is expected to hit the French market in about one month's time. The company has also finalised distribution to South Africa, to start in about six weeks.

Trois Frères Distillery is run by two brothers, Richard and Bernard D'Offay and partner Jacqueline D'Offay. The Takamaka Bay rums, namely the Dark, White and Coco rums are manufactured at the company's factory located within the Peugeot Servicing Centre premises at the Providence Industrial Estate.

Speaking to Business Nation, Mr Richard D'Offay said that over the past year they have been doing extensive market research in three European countries, namely France, Germany and England, as well as in South Africa, where their products, the Dark, White and Coco rums have been tested against leading beverages such as Captain Morgan, Red Heart rum and Bacardi. The Takamaka Bay rums were blind tasted in several independent hotels and restaurants in the mentioned countries.

"The results of the tests were very favourable," Richard said. "Both our Dark rum and Coco rum came out on top in both the cocktail and single rum tests, whilst the White rum received excellent reviews especially in the cocktail tests."

Richard said he was also pleased with the response from England, where a large national off-licence chain has expressed interest in the Dark rum. He was hopeful that a distribution agreement will be finalised during the course of this year.

Takamaka Bay rums will be supplied to three most popular bars and restaurants in Port Elizabeth in South Africa and this will be preceded by an extensive promotion of the products and its origin.

The two young businessmen, who normally take so much pride in locally made products, were optimistic that their rums would do well on the international market.

"Seychelles is a unique country loved by all foreigners who have visited its shores. We now want to bring part of this uniqueness to them," Bernard told Business Nation.

In line with this new development, the company, Richard said, has solved several of its capacity problems by investing in more automated machinery and was now going "full steam ahead with production."

"Our goal is to become a net foreign exchange earner and, despite the current economic difficulties, we are really motivated to contribute in a meaningful way to the country's economy," Richard said.

"We feel by producing and exporting a product that is of world class standard, we will be able to substitute import, save foreign exchange and make a difference in the overall growth of the country," he added.

Richard said they tried as much as they could to source for basic production materials locally.

Besides the export venture, the Takamaka Bay brand has also been entered in an international spirit contest to take place in London between April and June. Seychelles' rums will be competing against some of the world's best wines and spirits where they will be blind tasted and chemically analysed. The results will be announced in August. Richard and Bernard said they were both confident and excited about this new challenge, which also represented a great opportunity to meet big potential buyers. 

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