Simon describes his company’s raison d’être...
“It’s a bit like YouTube meets LinkedIn meets Facebook, meets dating websites. We are a drinks marketing company that uses a social networking platform as its base.
"We have created a community who we are trying to help by providing training online and a mechanism for recruiters and staff to connect in the hospitality world.”
Simon on catering for the target market...
“We’ve gone for a model that is high churn. So, for example, if you were to develop a social network for accountants it would be very much information based.
“The difference in the hospitality business is the turnover of staff. A lot of staff don’t see the hospitality business as a career path, but they use it as a means to continue their travels.
“I wanted to make things easier, take the pain out of recruitment and events, and to be able to enable people to move around the world pre-trained for these types of premises.”
On capitalising on marketing misapprehensions in the internet age...
“The success or demise of Bar Exchange is built on the premise that drinks companies have got their marketing upside down. This is not entirely their fault; it’s just the type of media that’s been available to them in the past.
“And what I mean by that is traditionally, in order to sell a new drink, say a Campari or Martini in the 1970s, they have always targeted people who drink Martini. Now, the consumer, because of the internet, is so well informed about brands in general, that they will do their own research.”
