AFRICA: ZIMBABWE: Lafarge Cement Zimbabwe re-brands

Lafarge Cement Zimbabwe has unveiled its new brand and has pledged to splurge a substantial amount of money on a three-month marketing and advertising campaign that kicks off this month.

Communications manager, Nyaradzo Makombe-Hazangwi, said the cement manufacturer had already "spent a lot" as it seeks to secure the Lafarge brand, which officially took over from the Circle Cement brand on Tuesday, 9 November 2010 on the Zimbabwean market.

"We are indeed on a campaign [involving] press advertisements in radio, TV, and local publications for the next three months," said Makombe-Hazangwi.

"We will be going on road shows in the city and doing in-store branding so we have a lot going on," she said.

Final phase of rebranding

Speaking at the re-branding ceremony on Tuesday, Lafarge Cement MD Jonathan Shoniwa, said the launch was "the final phase of our integration and re-branding into the big Lafarge family."

Lafarge is a building materials group based in Paris, France, with an annual turnover of over €20 billion. It presently operates in 79 countries worldwide with about 80,000 employees.

It has its footprint in 13 African countries namely South Africa, Zambia, Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, Nigeria, Benin, Cameroon, Egypt, Morocco and Zimbabwe.

Renamed Lafarge in 2008

The Zimbabwean operation was re-named Lafarge Cement in January 2008 but the new brand was not unveiled to the market and had retained the packaging of the old brand, Circle Cement, due to the economic crisis prevailing in the country then.

The launch on Tuesday saw the entry into the market of the re-branded Lafarge products.

"Today, we complete the final phase of our re-branding from Circle Cement to Lafarge Cement by unveiling to you our new packaging, bearing the Lafarge logo.

"The new bag is a mixture of the old and the new," said Shoniwa.

"As a sign of our continuity and assurance of the best quality you have gotten used to, we have maintained the circle on the bag, albeit much smaller, signifying that your tried and tested brand, though migrating, still maintains the same high quality cement that has been so central in building many houses, buildings, dams, bridges and indeed in building cities for decades," he said.