NAIROBI, Kenya, May 17 – Many graduates leave school with big expectations only to find out that a degree is no longer an automatic ‘green card” into interesting and well-paying job and many of them now find themselves with limited options.
With the increasing unemployment rate in the country, graduates are now opting for entrepreneurship to make a living.
Supamamas Ventures founder and Chief Executive Officer Christine Khasinah told Capital FM Business that after working for a year as a receptionist with an MBA in marketing at hand, she decided to call it quits and started her own business.
“After completing my MBA abroad, I came back to Kenya enthusiastic of a high paying Job, after a year of joblessness I got desperate and landed the receptionist job in a garage with the owner promising a marketing position in the company that never materialised,” Khasinah said.
The Idea of Supamama’s Ventures came into being when Khasinah became a mum in her receptionist job. She found out people expected her to be a “super mum” and efficiently handle everything and know everything.
“I wanted to do events to bring together other mums to empower mums with information and a platform where they can get all the support, be equipped and be the best they can be,” she explained.
Khasinah explained that she grouped a few moms and started a ‘merry-go-round’ and realized how ‘mums’ needed information about themselves and their babies.
“I realized how it was hard to find information of where to shop for babies, where to take kids out, finding a paediatrician, and how my friends and I relied on friends for information which was sometimes not accurate and I said to myself, why can’t I create that info hub?” she explained.
Khasinah started her entrepreneurial journey in 2011 after the frustration of waiting for her time. She grouped up with five of her ‘chama” friends to start an event organizing and info hub company by the name “super mums” to equip mothers with information.
“We started with one event, which was a happy fun day for mums and kids which was a success. Thereafter my partners went back to their day jobs; I fell out with my partners and decided to go solo.”
Khasinah revealed that after her fallout with her partners she organized another event with a new brand dubbed “Supamamas” that was an epic fail.
“Only 20 people came for the event, I was heartbroken wondering if leaving my job was the right decision, but I had to be strong,” she remembers.
Losing hope, she shelved the ‘Supamamas’ business and decided to open a tour and travel company that also didn’t last five months.
‘I broke down, my husband who was very supportive through these struggles also started doubting, but something deep in me told me to believe again, I woke up and decided to go back to my first love – ‘Supamamas.’
I set a date for an event in February 2012 and put all my efforts towards it and the event was outright successful,” she said.
