On the day she opened her store, the
main selling points were the sane ambience of her store and the rock-bottom
prices available there. She made flyers distributed them in the neighbourhood and
informed friends and family too. Then the wait began. On the first day, there
were no expectant shoppers queuing up in front of her store to get cheap
tomatoes. The next day was even longer and still no customers came. Unlike
non-perishables that have no expiry date, her wares were expiring and rotting
away right
under her nose and this brought so much apprehension into her mind. She started wondering how to get the word out there about her excellent grocery services. She lost appetite as her dismal sales kept gnawing at her. Then after a week of packing decomposing tomatoes and giving them to local food-sellers as give-away, an idea struck her: If a drinker won’t go to the bar, somehow the bottle will come to him.
under her nose and this brought so much apprehension into her mind. She started wondering how to get the word out there about her excellent grocery services. She lost appetite as her dismal sales kept gnawing at her. Then after a week of packing decomposing tomatoes and giving them to local food-sellers as give-away, an idea struck her: If a drinker won’t go to the bar, somehow the bottle will come to him.
She decided to hit the streets
and start selling her wares in branded polythene bags by the roadside. She jumped
through hoops before getting a hand who would help her peddle them. When she
finally got one, they went out test the novel approach on one of the city’s
busiest routes. They went during the rush-hour traffic and after two hours
succeeded in selling only one bag. They returned to the store dejected. On the
following day, the hand absconded; who could blame her for bailing out on an
untested idea that existed only in Bola’s head. This was the end of the second
week of no sales and plenty rotting tomatoes. Her appetite waned again. Then
her friend, Wale came around to buy some pepper and noticed her drawn
countenance. When he asked what was wrong, she poured out her heart to him. He helped by pointing out the fault in her premise for setting up the business: It is true that people don’t want to go to the market. But because of the lack of regular power supply, they can't power their refrigerators and so they buy the ingredients
in only small quantities. Therefore her emphasis on ‘cheap’ meant nothing because
price difference was only noticeable when shoppers buy in bulk. No one will
leave the markets in their neighbourhoods and drive for kilometers to go and
buy only 300 grams tomatoes no matter how cheaply it sold for.
Bola, started thinking again and
then decided to look elsewhere for her market. She approached supermarkets in
the city and proposed to supply fresh pepper, tomatoes and onions every day. One
manager was kind to give her a tryout. She washed the grocery, air-dried it,
packaged it in perforated cellophane bags and supplied them. The supermarket
was air-conditioned therefore her wares kept longer but more interestingly they
sold like hot cakes. On Thursday to Sunday, patronage was so high she could not
keep up. The middle and high class customers who shopped in the supermarket
truly hated the market, they bought in small quantities but above all the
grocery was brought close to them; they didn't have to go out of the way to get
them in her store.
Bola is stronger today. She has
learnt a lot in business and says what kills many entrepreneurial dreams is
discarding the drawing board. “If something fails, it is good to try and try
again”, she says, “but if it doesn't succeed it is insane to keep at it. What most
people do, which is even senseless, is to pack up and leave. Shouldn't they
have gone back to the drawing board?” she asked. Bola saw a great opportunity
but had a bad justification for the business plan. She went to the drawing
board and fine-tuned her justification but she still had a faulty business model.
She went yet again to her drawing board and tweaked the model and started
selling. A business plan is only draft, it is not etched in stone. Even the Ten
Commandments which is carved in a rock is broken every so often by all of us,
so why can’t we break our business plans and redraft another. We should never
be afraid to admit that our brilliantly drawn strategy is just not so brilliant
after all. We should be able to take as many second-chances as we need to make
our businesses work and not just stick it.
We make fun of people who quit
but I personally find people who persistently try things that have never worked
even funnier. I find a fewer sights more pitiful than people who are the same
after ten years or more. If something is not working, try another approach; and
if things are working look for ways to improve them. Thanks for reading, have a
great December and remember to share on your facebook and twitter.
Nice piece,I'm inspired
ReplyDeleteIt's as though a bright light shined on me after reading this. Every entrepreneur needs to read this.
ReplyDeleteSegun, you are gifted!