BY DELISA THWALA
MBABANE – The Standard Bank Luju Festival held a Business Roundtable. The event was themed ‘Taking local business beyond our borders.’
The event was held yesterday at House On Fire where Award-winning South African entrepreneur, founder and Chief Executive Officer of Bathu Sneakers, Theo Baloyi, encouraged local entrepreneurs.
The renowned entrepreneur launched his eponymous shoe brand in 2015, having previously served as a Senior Associate at PwC in Dubai. He was featured in the Forbes Under 30 list in 2019. In 2021, he won GQ’s Business Leader of the Year.
When speaking to invited entrepreneurs Baloyi said, “Business owners and other entrepreneurs should always be willing to share and motivate each other so they can move forward,”
His business currently employs about 400 South Africans.
Speaking at House on Fire yesterday, Baloyi encouraged local entrepreneurs to find their ideas and then create a plan to execute them, because if not executed, they would remain ideas. Baloyi said entrepreneurs should know their purpose, identify opportunities and seize them, take action and build in order to ignite hope.
He shared with the local entrepreneurs his inspirations and goals of his business, which included donating one million shoes to needy South Africans in the next 10 years.
He also shared that he started his shoe business because he wanted to make a shoe that Africans could identify with.
During the same event, there was a panel discussion, which featured at least four local entrepreneurs, including the owner of the popular fast food outlet, the Food Hut, Nomfuneko Ntshangase, who shared that she was looking forward to growing her business to become an international franchise.
She also shared that they were currently working around opening a butchery. The panel also shared their experiences on how COVID-19 affected their businesses.
They further urged entrepreneurs to invest in branding their products and their businesses at large as such would make their enterprises visible.
Meanwhile, Standard Bank officials conducted a brief elevator business pitch, where several entrepreneurs were made to present their businesses, detailing what they were all about and how they wished Standard Bank could assist them to expand their businesses beyond the borders.
One of the entrepreneurs, who had the chance to share about his business, was Sandile Makhanya of Makhanya Universe. Makhanya stated that his business was into media and marketing and he believed that if given a chance, he would like to expand to South Africa as he foresaw a wider market in that country.
