The awards of the third installment of the Notoriety Ranking of Cuban private brands, organized by the company since 2023 SMG Brandingwere delivered this Saturday at the Melía Cohiba Hotel in Havana.
This year the prizes were awarded in the categories of Ice Cream Parlours, Taxi Agencies and Gyms, in which the winners were The Gelato, Motorcycle Taxi and Pure Liferespectively.
Besides, Clandestinethe only winning brand in two categories from previous editions of the ranking, received the Brand Management Award this time.
As usual, the Notoriety Ranking presented not only the winner in each section but a top ten of the ten private brands most recognized by Havana residents in each sector, based on research carried out by the business development agency Right Foot.
For its implementation and the selection of its categories each year, the Ranking takes several criteria into account. First, they are private Havana brands; second, that they are registered in some of the forms of non-state management existing in the country; and third, that they are for mass consumption, so that their presence in the minds of the public can truly be measured.
“I always clarify that the ranking does not grant SMG. organizes it SMGbut really we do the research together with Right foot and the prize is awarded by the Havana public, who is the one who recognizes the brands,” he explains to OnCuba Suselmis Martín Guilarte, general director of SMG.
“So it is their award, it is not an award that we gave and that is given by the management they do, which is not necessarily associated with social networks but also with the experience, with the different moments of the ecosystem that a brand has,” he adds.
For her part, María Cleofas Gómez, owner of the Pura Vida gym, winner of the Gyms category, considers the Ranking as “a very important event” and highly values the award received based on the public’s criteria.
“That the Havana public recognizes a certain brand and selects it as a well-known brand is one of the most important recognitions that an entrepreneur can have, anywhere in the world, and in our country, much more so,” says Cleofas.
Three years measuring entrepreneurship
In each of its editions the Notoriety Ranking has measured different sectors of entrepreneurship in Cuba. In its first year, it awarded awards to the cosmetics, restaurant and fashion categories; and on its second occasion those of bars, accessories and e-commerce platforms. Brands like Clandestine, Katapulk, D’Brujas, The Biky and L.M. They have been winners.
“Research is expensive, in time and money, and we as an agency continue working, that is, we cannot stop just for the ranking issue. So we have to evaluate and since we know that there are categories that had not been tested, we wanted to give these sectors a chance now,” explains Suselmis Martín about the 2025 edition.
However, he points out, “those who already had a ranking want it to come back and I think that at some point we have to do like a second edition of the tested categories to see how they moved, if the work they have done has helped them move forward or backward in the minds of the public.”
“They ask us a lot to reach the provinces and we know that there are very valuable brands there, but that also requires other logistics. We are going to go step by step, we are a small agency and that is why we have focused on Havana, hopefully we can continue to extend it,” he responds to a question about the next growth that the ranking could have.
After three years of work, Martín assures that the event maintains its founding objective and that the response of the entrepreneurs has been his greatest motivation.
“We are in a context where sometimes we get a little discouraged, we see the gray or the black, you ask yourself a lot of questions about whether it is worth it. I know that it is very difficult to sustain work teams, motivate them and then when a ranking comes and they see themselves there, that is like ‘wao, yes, it is worth it,'” he points out.
“It is important that the private sector continues to have a reason and that the ranking can show it, because, in addition, sometimes you make decisions in business without data, without research and that is like going adrift, you go only with your intuition and so businesses do not always work, you need research and the ranking is part of that. So, the main objective that moves us today is to continue being a driving force for the private sector and for people to know that it is worth it,” concludes the director of SMG.
