Madeira Consorcio

74 Madeira Consorcio Meeting 15.10.2015

We welcomed Du. A. as guest, he gave us a presentation of his “ML” project.

He started it three years ago because he lost his job, and opted for an entrepreneur’s approach. The Name is based on a franchise from Lisbon, the chain aims to promote high quality souvenirs, produced in Portugal, more modern and appealing to a younger crowd.

Lisbon expanded to Porto; they are planning a shop in Rio as well.

ML has a shop in the airport which brings in more profit every month; unfortunately, the shop will have to go because the airport was sold to the VINCI group. They will redesign the airport and push the shops to a mall on the third floor. Also ML would be in competition with one of Vinci’s outlets so Du. is looking for a new 1a location in Town (the shop behind Mercado – where our Beach Basket now resides and attracts people – is not doing that well).

Du. presented his product line, also upcoming new items, and we liked what we saw! Some details: Textile products are not made in Madeira but on the mainland. Aprons are a hit with the tourists. He also sells canned Tuna.

He has a staff of four. He is also selling the products to other high class outlets and surprisingly, Summer is the best season. He is not working with the “old time” shops, they don’t understand the different approach and stuff his products in some corner. The Story Centre is dead, the space doesn’t seem to have the right location. Good news for him: He will get a shop in the Cruise Ship Terminal, this should give him good turnover.

E. suggested that he contact the organizers of special events, such as Funchal Jazz and the Organ Festival; their visitors want to buy a memento from a concert. We also had another great idea for him.

We might set up a meeting with Turismo with D. and Du to get the point across, they listen much better to a proposal coming from a foreigner.

By the way: the German Consulate is organizing weddings on Madeira, and the numbers are increasing rapidly!

We also spoke about the ad idea from Ursula. The idea is to channel citizen’s ideas to the government via small (free) newspaper ads. The group was in favour of this.

U. and D. are in contact with the Diario for other ads on a weekly English page in the Diario but the Newspaper is overworked and understaffed. E. has a good contact to the Manager of JM, he will talk to him to set up a meeting, other members will be approached to help as well.

As we have very few birds on both islands, R. brought the idea that people should be encouraged to build birds nests, U. mentioned insect houses which are not for honey bees but for wild bees, they carry a much bigger percentage of the pollination process. The negative impact on the birds and insects stems from the extensive use of insecticides.

We discussed the compensation companies have to give to the city when they get building permits. They are obliged to repave roads when they damaged them with their lorries but they try to get away with the minimum instead of doing more and incurring the goodwill of the long-suffering neighbours. Suggestions for such compensation could come from the citizens, they know best what is needed in their street.

Our next meeting will be on Nov 19.