How Kevin Hedderwick built a colossus
Hedderwick’s audacious 16-year journey wrong-footed critics every step of the way
Armed with what he describes as a "boere matric" from East London, where his parents were public servants, Hedderwick worked his way from being a merchandiser at Distell to marketing director. He then joined SA Breweries, where his peers rated him highly, but his lack of the "right" academic qualifications thwarted his ambitions. So he quit, moved back to East London and used his life’s savings to buy a franchise of the Keg pub chain. Within a short time, he was appointed MD of Keg Franchising, which was then sold to the JSE-listed Kingco in 1997. Hedderwick’s break came when he was noticed by the Halamandaris family, founders of burger outlet Steers. The Halamandaris brothers had emigrated to SA from Greece in the 1950s, with just US$50 between them, to join their uncle, George Halamandres, who had opened the first Steers take-away outlet in the east of Johannesburg.
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