Competition spawns idea for convenience store

A one-man business in the form of a townshipbased convenience store will be an essential supplier of everyday commodities for residents of a Tshwane community. This shop was an idea born out of a competition aimed at developing entrepreneurs at Regent Business School.

Tshepo Maapi and his team won a Shark Tank type of competition aimed at helping contestants understand what is needed to start and run a business.

Maapi is the owner of Tawkkul convenience store based in Winterveld, a suburb of Mabopane in Tshwane. The store is located within a mosque compound and en route to four schools.

His initial winning idea was for an egg and chicken farm; however, given that the prize money was only R60 000 and the high cost of entry into the poultry business, Maapi and his teammates applied what they learnt during their year-long study at Regent Business School, instead pivoting towards a more realistic business idea – and hence the convenience store was born.

This competition was initiated by Hoosen Essof, manager at redHUB, a specialised unit of Regent that focuses on entrepreneurship, which aims to equip students with 21st century employability skills, among other things.

Essof says Regent Business School facilitated funding of R60 000 through the help of the South African National Zakáh Fund (SANZAF), a non-profit organisation in Durban that also sponsored the students’ studies at the institution.

“I have also helped the students identify suitable premises, negotiate with the landlord, link them with potential suppliers, and advise them on structuring their work (shifts) and business skills (daily recordkeeping),” he says.

LEVELLING UP IN BUSINESS

Maapi says Samukeliso Mncubeshe, an entrepreneurship lecturer at Regent Business School, helped with all the business planning.

“From social media marketing to website design, Regent Business School went over and beyond educating me on the fundamentals in modern day business, especially when starting a new brand in the market.

“Mr Essof even helped in getting us placed at a large wholesaler in Tshwane, Advance Cash and Carry, so that we could learn the ins and outs of running a shop. That was a great learning for us,

as the majority of their customers run township-based spazas and supermarkets. In fact, Regent Business School’s support till this very moment has been overwhelming. Words cannot express how grateful I am.

“I look forward to the Regent Business School bringing more opportunities such as this to young entrepreneurs,” he states.

Maapi says Winterveld is one of the more impoverished and underprivileged communities in Gauteng. Therefore, he is taking a ‘convenience store’ approach, which means he is not selling to monthly grocery shoppers but to everyday customers.

Having just started trading, Maapi says that he is discovering what his customers need and will adjust his stock accordingly.

He has not lost his ambition of owning a poultry farm in the future.

Since 1998, Regent Business School (RBS) has been at the forefront of premium management education across the continent. Headquartered in South Africa, RBS’s acclaimed business, finance and management programmes have helped individuals and organisations build and sustain competitive advantages in a rapidly-changing, complex business environment. With campuses in all major hubs of South Africa – including Durban, Johannesburg, Cape Town and Pretoria – as well as in SADC countries Swaziland and Namibia, the institution’s alumni base of 10 000 is rapidly expanding.

RBS’s leading centres for excellence – The Institute of Entrepreneurship, The Centre for Islamic Finance and Banking, and The Centre for Public Sector Administration Management and Innovation – are popular with high performers who are serious about making positive, impactful change within the global finance and management sectors. It’s latest Fourth Industrial Revolution innovation hub and academic makerspace, the iLeadLAB, is at the forefront of the institution’s strategy to empower students and stakeholders with in-demand skills as well as the hard and soft digital skills for the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

RBS has developed a series of programmes that are designed to provide students and organisations with the management competencies and critical skills necessary to build and sustain competitive advantages in a rapidly changing and complex business environment. RBS’s expertise has evolved through continuous research and development undertaken in delivering a range of local and international business and management education programmes.

As a specialised education and training provider of managementrelated learning programmes, RBS has the capacity, systems and resources to deliver courses with the flexibility of on-site, off-site as well as web-based teaching and learning.

It is well known that successful companies make deliberate efforts to ensure that the training of staff does not compromise production and business time. RBS delivers courses that are flexible and supported through a range of support facilities and services (i.e. telephonic support, face-to-face lectures, online and web support, and virtual classrooms). This strategy contributes significantly to placing partner organisations at the forefront of competitiveness, having their staff trained and uplifted while still maintaining optimal productivity.

Above all else, RBS takes great pride in providing its graduates with critical thinking and soft skills that empower them with well-thought-out insights into the theoretical and practical aspects of a rapidly changing external environment within which businesses are obliged to operate.