By Jayesh Reddy
Almost 80 percent of small businesses in South Africa fail – but there are ways to ensure your passion project doesn’t end up as just another statistic.
A new case study on local artisanal ice-cream sensation Roska ice-cream, published by Henley Business School Africa, serves up three top tips.
Picture this: it’s COVID-19. It’s lockdown. You’ve been at home for months – hours behind the screen for work, then hours behind the screen after work. Then, one day, while browsing your social media, you stumble across a memory: it’s about an ice cream maker you received ten years earlier.
Suddenly it all comes back to you: you’re a kid. It’s summer, you’re eating ice cream. It’s a beautiful, nostalgic feeling – it feels so free, so different to the claustrophobia of lockdown, of work. You want it back – and you want others to feel it, too.
This exact story happened to Kamal Manilal, who with his wife Roshni is the owner of Roska Ice Cream.
Now an award-winning artisanal South African ice cream brand, Roska started out as something of a hobby, with the business being operated in the dining room of the Manilal family home.
Nostalgia certainly has a part to play in Roska’s success, but the main drivers are the same as those that can drive the success of any small business.
And in South Africa, where almost 80 percent of small businesses fail, stories of businesses like Roska can seem like fairytales.
But they shouldn’t – they should rather seem like blueprints.
1. Ideas – belief – hard work
Having an idea is one thing – but totally believing in it is another.
Manilal had such belief in his idea that he was prepared to leave his corporate job for it. I’m not saying that you should forfeit your income in order to dedicate yourself to your passion project. People who have this opportunity are very fortunate.
But the point remains: you need that total conviction. Because, as it did for Manilal, it unlocks the most vital components of a business’s success: hard work, planning, and product quality.
Lack of planning is a major contributor to small businesses failing in South Africa. Short-term and long-term plans are critical if you want to achieve your goals, and they make it much easier to track your incremental – but tangible – progress.
And remember: hard work and planning are good and well, but mean little if your product does not meet anybody’s needs. Before launching, consider taking a design thinking approach: do some boots-on-the-ground research to find out if your product is actually going to fill a niche.
2. A support system
The goal of any business is to upscale – it’s critical.
Naturally, Manilal made growth his priority – but he suffered along the way.
Grueling days at work made Manilal question whether this job was for him. He spent days making ice cream, and his evenings were spent cleaning in preparation for the next day. There was no time for anything else. Though this was his passion project, it was taking its toll.
Without Manilal’s support network, Roska might not have succeeded. His wife, Roshni, provided him both emotional and professional support. She came on board the business in order to build the brand and implement strategy, helping to steer Roska towards sustainability. Manilal’s family and friends supported him, too.
Entrepreneurship is notorious for causing people to neglect their own wellbeing. This can have a domino effect on a person’s life: greater stress, lower quality productivity, and ultimately a failed business and spoiled personal and professional relationships.
Prevention is key. If you’re starting a small business, make sure you have a web of people who – even if they are not in it with you – are there for you, know what it is you are doing, and who are able to check up on you regularly.
3. Network – and be OK with starting small
Now, your immediate network is mostly personal. And they’ll help you survive. But a professional network will help you to thrive.
In South Africa, a lack of market access contributes to one of the highest small business failure rates in the world. So, networks are necessary – and most of the time, those networks start small. For Manilal, this was certainly the case.
First, he began selling ice cream to friends and family. Then, he had the opportunity to be a vendor at a corporate event. It was at there that he was noticed and nominated as a South African Tourism Services Association incubatee.
The incubation programme gave him a wealth of additional skills: growth plan development, marketing support, funding opportunities, and data support, all of which have contributed to Roska’s triumphs.
And sure, it can seem like there’s a lot of luck involved in this part of the story. But Manilal wouldn’t have had that luck if he did not take the opportunity to be a vendor at a corporate event. And he’d never have had that opportunity if he didn’t put in the work, execute his plan, and ensure that his product was of a high quality.
It takes a village
With unemployment rising in South Africa, the need for more entrepreneurs to build successful businesses has never been greater. But building a business is like raising a child – it takes a village. So, the last lesson to share here is that we – customers, educators, corporate sponsors, and government – need to support our budding entrepreneurs. Because building a thriving economy – well, that takes a whole country.
Jayesh Reddy is a lecturer and executive fellow at Henley Business School Africa, and co-author of a new case study Churning sweet childhood memories into a successful business venture: the case of Roska Artisan Ice Cream, published by Henley Business School Africa.
BUSINESS REPORT