AFRICAN SPEAKER BUREAU | CURATED FOR THE SPAR GROUP
The Board Makes the Decision. The Store Determines the Outcome.
SPAR has made retailer profitability its primary measure and is targeting early November to appoint its permanent chair and additional directors. Nosipho Siwisa Damasane brings experience from a different industry with a familiar challenge: decisions that must cross commercial and organisational boundaries before they produce results.
SPAR's independent retailers trade under agreements and brand standards, yet each owner decides every week where to buy. SPAR earns that cooperation through service, margin and evidence, and a decision taken at head office reaches the store through a distribution centre, a buyer, a fleet and a regional team before the retailer sees it. Nosipho Siwisa Damasane led a different system with a familiar shape. As Chief Executive Officer of Richards Bay Coal Terminal she ran a terminal shared by the coal producers who own it, fed by an average of 27 trains a day from 49 loading points up to 850 kilometres away, on a rail network operated by Transnet. The terminal set consecutive export records in 2014 and 2015, reaching 75.4 million tonnes as coal prices fell, and she credited the result to the partnership with the rail operator. She now chairs the terminal's board. African Speaker Bureau brings external intelligence into the room to challenge internal thinking before reality does.
About this collection
SPAR has already named the problem in its own words. Presenting its interim results in June 2026, the group said it had failed to treat retailer profitability as its primary metric, and it has made that metric the centre of the turnaround. The half-year showed why it matters. Operating profit fell 45.3 per cent to R740.5 million. In KwaZulu-Natal, the distribution centre pushed the top line and loyalty hard without the warehouse and fleet capacity to carry the volume, and R123 million of operating profit went with it. Black Friday promotional spend contributed a further R212 million to the decline without a commensurate return. Retailer loyalty stood at 78.5 per cent against a target of 80. Each exposed a gap between the intended commercial result and the organisation's capacity or discipline to deliver it. The repair is under way. KwaZulu-Natal returned to monthly operating profit in the first half, out-of-stock rates have fallen, and SPAR reports that collaboration with its independent retailers continues to improve. Its September update was candid about what remains: operational improvements have not yet translated into sufficient earnings or cash benefits, and the benefits are expected to build through FY2027. That is the stretch where a turnaround is won or lost. SPAR has a plan and is renewing its board. What decides the outcome is whether each decision reaches the store with enough clarity, ownership and momentum to change the retailer's numbers. Sources: [SPAR trading statement, 29 May 2026](https://senspdf.jse.co.za/documents/SENS_20260529_S521963.pdf), [SPAR board announcement, 17 August 2026](https://senspdf.jse.co.za/documents/SENS_20260817_S601310.pdf), and reporting on the [interim results of 10 June 2026](https://www.businessday.co.za/companies/2026-06-10-spar-profit-slumps-on-black-friday-overspend-and-cost-of-bad-debt/) and the [voluntary update of 28 September 2026](https://www.businessday.co.za/companies/2026-09-28-spars-turnaround-is-still-waiting-for-its-payoff/).
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