The man who went from waiting tables at Spur to building a R1 billion empire in South Africa

Salmon was born in Johannesburg and spent part of his childhood in Benoni before returning to Johannesburg, where he studied for a Bachelor of Commerce at Wits University. 

He later qualified as a chartered accountant and completed a postgraduate diploma in accounting at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.

Before his formal career began, Salmon took on various jobs to support himself, including waiting tables at Spur and working at McDonald’s in the UK. 

He credits these early jobs with giving him a solid grounding in customer service and responsibility. His interest in car rentals started while working at Deloitte, where one of his major clients was Imperial Car Rental. 

The idea of starting his own business began to take shape while he was still employed. “I was working at the time and there was a lot of politics,” he recalled in an interview.

“I was chatting to my wife and saying I could do this [car rentals] so well. And she just said one day, ‘Well, the first step is resigning.’ And I was like, that’s right. That is actually the first step.”

With limited capital and a Toyota Quantum he owned, Salmon started small. Realising the Quantum wasn’t ideal for rentals, he made a plan. 

“I gave my mom my car and started renting out hers. That’s the basics of car rental; fleet management and trying to make it work with what you’ve got,” he said. 

Getting finance was his biggest challenge. “You can work hard on marketing and fleet management, but getting the money is difficult, especially when you don’t have much,” he said. 

The gap in the market

He was able to borrow against his home loan to grow the business just before the 2010 FIFA World Cup. During this time, Salmon saw an opportunity to provide vehicles to other rental companies when they were overbooked. 

He called this “sub-hiring”, renting vehicles to larger companies during peak periods. At the same time, there was growing demand from individuals who didn’t qualify for vehicle finance. 

Many of these customers were Zimbabwean nationals looking for affordable options like the VW City Golf. That’s when Pace shifted toward long-term car rentals.

“We realised everybody else was servicing the tourism market. But many people outside tourism needed to rent vehicles—contractors, film crews, even people rolling out fibre or delivering medicine,” Salmon said.

He and his wife kept their spending low and reinvested everything into expanding the fleet. They found customers through platforms like Gumtree and added more cars as money allowed. 

Not having airport branches forced them to find other customers, many of whom were small businesses that needed reliable transport. 

“Entrepreneurs would get a contract to fix ceilings in schools, but didn’t have vehicles. They’d come to us and quite often, they’d end up renting month after month,” he said.

Later, Salmon spotted another gap: e-hailing. He decided to market directly to Uber drivers by handing out pamphlets himself. 

“The Uber drivers just kept moving as I tried to hand them out. It took me three hours and I handed out seven pamphlets,” he said. Despite the slow start, it worked overtime.

Pace began offering cars to Uber drivers, focusing on models that made financial sense. Instead of just giving drivers the most popular cars, Salmon’s team helped them choose models that would make them more money after costs. 

The ‘golden streak’

By 2013, the company had a fleet of 100 vehicles. That number doubled each year, reaching over 5,000 vehicles today. The fleet is now valued at over R1 billion.

When Covid-19 hit, car rentals took a hit, but the business found a way to keep going. They registered as an essential service and continued operating. 

Then came a shortage of new vehicles due to global chip supply issues, which actually helped rental companies. 

“From October that year, you couldn’t even buy a car. Whatever you had, you could rent out. It was a two-year golden streak,” he said.

Pace has since diversified into other areas, including acquiring Supreme Forklift to broaden its operations. 

The company now operates nine branches, including Johannesburg, Kempton Park, Pretoria, Cape Town, Gqeberha, and Umhlanga. 

It rents out everything from budget hatchbacks to minibuses, panel vans, bakkies, and SUVs. Businesses use Pace to scale their transport up or down depending on the time of year or project needs.

Despite the scale of the business, Salmon is still involved and signs surety for all the company’s vehicle financing. “Still today, I sign personal surety for all of our HPs and debt,” he said.

Looking back, he doesn’t believe a lack of capital should stop people from starting a business. 

“You always hear people saying they can’t start because they can’t get funding. Yes, it’s difficult, but you’ve got to use what you’ve got. I just put extra money from working into the business and grew it. That compounding is massive,” he said. 

“You don’t always need equity investors to begin. You just need to figure out the little steps to get there.”

Issued on BusinessTech by Malcolm Libera | https://businesstech.co.za/news/business/832958/the-man-who-went-from-waiting-tables-at-spur-to-building-a-r1-billion-empire-in-south-africa/