“During my two decades here with Nike in Rwanda, I saw Rwanda change — new roads, new buildings, new companies, new restaurants, new federal parks. It offers you a sense of possibility, of going-for-it, of making big dreams occur,” says Lauren.
So when Nike requested her to return to the US, she made the move to leave her job and keep to pursue. The idea? A distribution company.
“I thought to myself that if I go now, I’d be missing out on the biggest opportunity of my life — that no one has actually cracked food distribution in Africa.”
Mustering the courage was tough, however, the venture’s potential was apparent. In September 2014, she established GET IT, a food services firm established in Rwanda’s capital Kigali.
“Really, it was my easy home grocery buying that prompted GET IT,” Lauren clarifies. “I needed to go to five stores to obtain the ingredients to make something easy such as lasagne. I thought if I could not find what I needed, maybe others are having that problem too.”
The original plan was supposed to furnish families the following day and the product gets delivered.
But one afternoon GET IT received an order from a restaurant. Lauren questioned why the restaurant was not employing a food distribution company that was commercial, however, to her surprise, no one has been offering this support.
Today kitchens have been GET the primary focus of IT. It provides and resources a variety of frozen fresh and dry goods — such as meat and vegetables, fruit, and dairy — combined with kitchen materials.
“We serve anyone who’s cooking for people eating outside of their houses. On the other end, we serve luxury lodges, hotels and restaurants that are notable in Kigali… On the flip side, we all serve schools, churches, and company canteens,” Lauren clarifies. “We cater largely for industrial kitchen needs rather of household needs since we see that there are plenty of opportunities there. Households are a really small portion of what we do.”
Fundraising learnings
Lauren began GET IT together with US$5,000 of her personal savings, but has then raised $1m in equity financing.
“For the first year of the company, I lived in my savings. I wished to be sure they would find a return and that before I took people’s money, I had demonstrated that investment could grow. I was able to get to revenue generation in that first phase without external investment. It meant that raising money was a lot more straightforward after I was ready for this. It is easier to sell a working company as a great investment, than an notion of an organization,” she describes.
“I learned quickly that if you ask for advice, you will be provided money. But when you ask for money, you’re going to be offered information.”
Assembling a diversified customer base
thus far, one of GET IT’s biggest challenges has been dropping a crucial customer.
“Last year, we grew really fast with one customer. We’d more incoming need, but we could not take it on, because we’d overgrow ourselves,” Lauren reveals. “Unfortunately, after a few months, this single customer decided to take another direction. We were left back at square one. It was a major struggle to go from high to low. Nonetheless, it’s made us a much better, more resilient firm.”
This led to GET IT revamping its infrastructure and purchasing a few of the biggest private off-grid chilly rooms in Rwanda.
“We raised our working capital reservations and obtained our ISO 22000 food safety certificate, the first in the area for our kind of company,” she says. “The great news is that today, our revenue is increasing at 20-50 percent month-over-month.
“We had our best month in September, a 100% earnings increase from August. That no one customer makes up more than 5% of our earnings we have diversified our earnings base. Customers are coming at a speed we can not keep up to us. But annually 17, we built to manage it in a way we could not. It is the very best form of problem to have.”
“We are building models to change food distribution to humanitarian crises such as refugee camps or famine-hit regions — to incorporate locally-sourced fruits and vegetables into food aid. The list is endless — and that is what makes doing this company so energising.”
Surviving from the startup universe
One matter Lauren didn’t expect before becoming an entrepreneur has been the high psychological cost of starting a provider. She considers herself blessed to have the help of both parents and her husband, who transferred out of California to Rwanda.
“With their assistance, I believe I would have gone mad by now. A startup can be a marathon, not a sprint. So I have also developed some pretty strict routines to maintain my sanity and avoid burn off,” she says.
Since being an entrepreneur Lauren has learnt to not be fearful of trying new things, but highlights the value of beginning modestly and testing the market. Small mistakes are somewhat less debilitating.
“Don’t go big too quickly… Attempt to get 20 customers who adore your merchandise and can not wait to order your goods. If you can not get 20 customers to appreciate your product, then you do not have a product that is great. And if you can not get 20 people to enjoy your merchandise, you can not purchase a hundred let alone a thousand.”
So what’s Lauren’s information to entrepreneurs? “Don’t start a company,” she says. “If you wish to start a company, locate 10 people and ask them to persuade you not to start a company. You’ve got a bullet if you can be persuaded by them: it means you are not going out to become a entrepreneur. And that is okay men and women are intended to make companies. If no one can convince you it’s a lousy idea — that indicates you might just possess the make-up to be an entrepreneur.”
When Lauren Russell Nkuranga came in Rwanda she had the clichéd western notion that Africa is an area of war, poverty and illness, and is distressed to get charity.
Source
http://www.bizcommunity.com/Article/178/423/170812.html
source http://www.sandiegojobsondemand.com/nike-project-to-start-food-company-is-quit-by-entrepreneur/
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