Şektaş

Şektaş is the company owned by Zaim and responsible for launching Meltem soda. In the novel, it appears through the striking reach of its advertisements, the modest scale and labor of its factory, and the social outings Zaim organizes around the business. Its public image of novelty and success contrasts with the private distress Kemal carries even into a company visit.

Ownership and Product Launch

Zaim is identified as the owner of Şektaş, which had recently launched Meltem. He describes the company’s timing as fortunate, while the product’s rapid visibility suggests a successful promotional campaign: Berrin has seen its German model, Inge, in a cinema advertisement and says the drink can now be found throughout the city’s kiosks. The promotion has reached beyond children to a broad public, making Meltem a familiar presence in urban life.

The advertising also gives the company a social face. Inge’s image links the new drink to modern commercial spectacle, and Zaim introduces her to his friends as a German model whose advertisements appear across Istanbul. The product’s popularity becomes a topic of conversation at their gathering, where Nurcihan praises its strawberry flavor. Şektaş is thus presented not only as a manufacturer but as a business whose brand circulates through cinemas, kiosks, and elite social conversation.

The Büyükdere Factory

Zaim invites his companions to visit the factory in Büyükdere, on the Bosphorus, and promises to follow the tour with a cruise and a picnic in Belgrade Forest. At the factory, giant pictures of Inge cover the building walls beside leftist slogans that have been painted over. The juxtaposition places commercial imagery within a city marked by political messages, without making the factory itself a political organization.

The visitors see the sterilizing and bottling lines, where women in headscarves and blue aprons work under the direction of cheerful, outspoken supervisors. Despite the impression created by Meltem’s many advertisements, the factory employs only sixty-four people. The difference between the brand’s extensive public visibility and the relatively small workforce gives the business a distinct scale: its reach is built as much through advertising as through the operation witnessed on the tour.

Business as Social Occasion

Şektaş also provides the occasion for Zaim to bring friends together. His factory invitation expands into a planned Bosphorus cruise and picnic in Belgrade Forest, and the excursion carries Meltem bottles among its provisions. At the earlier gathering, Zaim’s business success helps him sustain conversation and draw Nurcihan into dancing; later, the factory visit extends that social performance into a carefully arranged day out.

For Kemal, however, the company outing cannot displace his grief over Füsun. During the factory tour and the picnic that follows, he remains absorbed in thoughts of her, even while noticing the clothes and manners of the party and taking part in its activities. Şektaş’s tour therefore creates a contrast between collective ease and private pain: the company’s public-facing world offers movement, novelty, and sociability, but it cannot release Kemal from his longing.