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Brian Joffe

Entrepreneur and executive

By South African Index Editorial Desk · Published

Portrait of Brian Joffe.
Photograph: Business Day · Source · Copyright retained by source publication. Resized and converted to WebP for this site.

Brian Joffe founded the business that became Bidvest in 1988. Bidvest’s annual reports record that he served first as executive chairman and later as chief executive. [1][3]

Biography

Bidvest’s director biographies state that Joffe founded Bid Corporation in 1988. The business became the foundation of the Bidvest group. [1]

He served as executive chairman in the earlier phase and became chief executive in 2004. Bidvest’s reports consistently identify him as the group’s founder. [2][3]

The corporate name requires care because Bidvest later separated a foodservice business under the Bid Corporation name. The historical Bidvest reports use “Bid Corporation” for Joffe’s original 1988 company, which is the origin described here. [2]

Key contributions

Founded Bidvest’s predecessor business in 1988 and built a diversified services and trading group. [1][3]

Led the group in both executive-chairman and chief-executive roles. [2]

Career timeline

  1. Founded the business that became Bidvest. [1]

  2. Bidvest records his formal appointment from March 1989. [2]

  3. Became chief executive after serving as executive chairman. [3]

Associated organisations

Sources

  1. Bidvest, Annual Report 2011: Directorate, 2011-06-30. Original source. Accessed 2026-09-25. ↩
  2. Bidvest, Annual Report 2012: Directorate, 2012-06-30. Original source. Accessed 2026-09-25. ↩
  3. Bidvest, Annual Integrated Report 2013: Directors’ report, 2013-06-30. Original source. Accessed 2026-09-25. ↩