January 2015
| Business World
101
Jamaica. In line with Michael's mantra, how-
ever, he refused to succumb to the seemingly
dire circumstances.
"I saw an ad in the paper the following morn-
ing for the sale of Avis’ second-hand fleet,
and that's how we started out, just to pay the
mortgage," he explains. "Eventually, because
real estate in Jamaica was dying at the time,
my partner and I saw further opportunity
with the car rental business."
The pair decided to invest more significant-
ly into the business, and were successful in
capitalizing on the failings of the big-name
international car rental companies.
"We would get clients coming over here from
Avis and Hertz with smoke coming out of
their ears because they couldn't get a vehicle,"
says Michael. "Out of that, we developed our
mission statement, which reads: 'The mis-
sion of Island Car Rental is to achieve con-
sistent, superior levels of customer satisfac-
tion, employee satisfaction, and profitability,
while contributing to the growth of the tour-
ism industry in Jamaica, and remaining the
leader in the Caribbean car rental industry.'"
