Oct. 9, 2002 – In marking the 90th anniversary of doing business in the Virgin Islands, executives of The West Indian Co. took time reflected recently on the progress made by an enterprise that began as a supplier for visiting steamships and which provided the first electrical power to St. Thomas.
But WICO's chief executive officer, Edward E. Thomas Sr., says the company's most important role to date may be the one it plays today as host to the cruise industry and as such a center of the territory's economic well-being..
Recently Gov. Charles W. Turnbull and the Virgin Islands' Danish consul, Soren Blak, joined other dignitaries at a celebration banquet held at Coral World. Speaking at the gathering, Thomas said that the major economic role WICO plays in 2002 does credit to the V.I. government, which acquired the company from Danish interests in 1996.
"Just the mere acquisition of the Danish company by the government of the Virgin Islands solidified the government's position in favor of this island being a cruise ship-destination," Thomas said, "because the Danish company didn't have to do this. They could have said, 'Let's go back to bauxite.' And today, cruise ship tourism generates $700 million in total economic activity, as opposed to $540 million provided by overnight visitors."
Thomas continued, "We are not a a tourism entity; we are a docking facility. But we are providing an infrastructure that allows tourists to come here and spend all this money."
The West Indian Co. was founded in 1912 by Hans N. Andersen, who built a dock where passing steamships could load up on coal and crude oil. The company moved into a number of other profitable ventures, becoming an agent for Standard Oil in 1920 and creating a transshipment point for bauxite during World War II. It also branched out to St. John, building the North Shore cottages which would later become the Caneel Bay Resort.
When the cruise industry began to grow in the early 1960s, WICO rebuilt its bunkering dock in Charlotte Amalie to accommodate the tourist trade. It set up a trading department in the 1970s but later abandoned it as profitability declined.
The V.I. government began the process of acquiring WICO in 1993, selling the adjacent Havensight Shopping Center to the Government Employees Retirement System. Since then, The West Indian Co. has operated as a semi-autonomous government entity, expanding and maintaining one of the region's top cruise-ship facilities.
Later this month, Thomas says, WICO will place a commemorative insert in the print daily newspapers. The company's public relations director, Calvin Wheatley, says further celebrations are in the works, with a public event to be scheduled around Christmas or "the end of the year, which would be the end of the anniversary year."
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