– An entertainment tycoon in his own right
He has summoned almost every means of communication to propel the power of local entertainment. After 14 years of success, one can arguably say that Kerwin Randall Bollers has perhaps mastered the art of pleasing the masses.
Born October 14, 1978, Bollers, with all his accomplishments, still considers himself to be a “country boy at heart.”
The proud father of two boys recalled “sweet days” of growing up in Essequibo, where he climbed a lot of fruit trees and reaped the spoils, caught birds “on the back dam” and doing “bush-cooks.”
He actually came to Georgetown in his teens and attended City College. Given his love for children, he pursued a teaching career after graduating from the business school and got a stint as a junior teacher at South Road Nursery.
Bollers did this for a few years but soon left in pursuit of his first love — the world of Entertainment.
He started out as a DJ for a family sound system called “Deportee” for four to five years then went on to another called “Stone love” where he spent another three to four years. But this was not enough.
The birth of Hits & Jamz and Jamzone
Being the “go-getter” that he is, Bollers was “on to the next big thing,” something with his signature, his flavor, his style written all over it, a new level of entertainment.
In 2000, he made contact with an old school friend, Rawle Ferguson, Rawle’s brother Dwight Ferguson and Troy Mendonza. They concocted Guyana’s next big hit on the local entertainment scene — Hits and Jamz and Jamzone.
“The name actually came about because I used to do a radio show on 98.1 called Jamzone while Rawle did one called Hitsville. So when we got together, we called our company Hits and Jamz, because it represents a collaboration of the names of our own radio shows,” he explained.
Bollers said that at the time, the entertainment industry was flooded with the usual fairs and Bar-B-Ques. For him, the time had finally come to shake things up and with his team in place, they pursued two major events — Jamzone and the Car and Bike Show.
“We paid attention to a lot of American television and one of our favourite things was the Spring break (a vacation period in early spring at universities and schools mainly in the USA which includes a variety of parties). We thought doing something similar in Guyana would be successful because it has never been done before. But if we were going to use that idea as our template we wanted to put our twist to it by promoting tourism and so we incorporated a pageant aspect and that is how we got the Miss Jamzone pageant,” Bollers said.
He said that the Car and Bike Show was another huge event which lasted for probably five to six years.
Bollers emphasised that the mission of his Hits and Jamz team is to give Guyanese high quality entertainment and a taste of something different with every project they pursue.
Building his business with love and dedication has catapulted him to a position of prominence in Guyana. He has earned the respect of the masses by delivering on his promise to provide satisfying servings of fun and thrill.
But even with all this, he has the emerging competitors to deal with on a daily basis and he isn’t scared about it. In fact, he is happy.
He said, “I don’t look at what we do as a competition. For me it is about building an industry. It would be foolish of us to think we can build it alone. You need that support. You need different players because there is only so much you can do and the industry is not for one person or a few. Besides, more players keep everyone on their toes.”
He added, “But as I said, for us it is all about building an industry and we want to be part of the process of giving the industry structure. Thirty years from now we want to look back and be able to say that we were able to contribute to the foundation.”
The Hits and Jamz party promotion remains the most influential force in the local entertainment industry and has brought many international superstars to Guyana’s shores such as R. Kelly, Akon, John Legend and Rick Ross.
Bollers, however, said that his accomplishments will be complete when he brings Barbadian singer Rihanna to perform in Guyana.
Bollers and his team have secured positions in radio, pageantry, television, party promotion, award shows, and now a water park. Regardless of his responsibilities, he said that being a father will always be his most prized and important role.
