Yogini Prabhu

Business: Owner, Fun N Shop, Ashoka Restaurant

Established: 2005

Citizen: Indian

Future plans: To start an NGO for helping the girl child in India

She came to Nairobi as a homemaker in 1993, with her Banker husband. Little did she know her entrepreneurial skills would soon take wings and one day she would own a supermarket and a restaurant in Diamond Plaza, Nairobi’s “little India.”

Coming from a prominent business family in Karkala, Karnataka, all she had was her will and support from her husband to start her first venture in a foreign land. “My relative lack of experience in doing business often posed as a huge challenge. Yet I would start my day with a smile and enter my shop only to face a barrage of complaints concerning staff , procurement, logistics, official harassment etc.,” she recollects. “ I faced them all,” she says with a big smile. To begin with she had a very successful fruits and vegetables business, which she sold to a large supermarket chain. Not one to sit idle and rest on her laurels, in 2005, she started her supermarket Fun N Shop. Not by scouring bulky management books, but the failures and successes in her business have helped her move forward. Starting a restaurant and entering the food business was a step in this direction. “We are now more popular for food,” she says. Very similar to many establishments in India, where supervision has become essential to keep an eye on pilferage by employees, be it through the lens of a camera or the human eye, many shop owners hire staff especially for this. “Yeah, its an added cost, but essential,” says Yogini regretfully.

Having gone soft on some matters, she feels did cost her. Today she is a lot tougher and hires only those who are related to her staff or are recommended by friends. Though cultural barriers exist, she strongly feels having a healthy interpersonal relationship with her African staff goes a long way. They say doing business in Africa is very different, it is driven more by relationships and less by transactions.

“Simple things like knowing their full names, listening to them, understanding their problems,” says Yogini helps create bridges and not walls between the employer and the employee. Though the job keeps her on her toes, she has no complaints, but for one. “In the past 13 years I can’t recollect even a single time when my husband and I have managed to travel anywhere together,” she chides. When compared to the level of confidence that is oozing in her today, her sense of independence, her decision making skills she cant thank her stars enough that have helped her start a business far away from her homeland.

And when it comes to sticking to the rules of the land, all she has to say is never break the law and every time you see yourself going downhill, a warm smile and confidence can help you bounce back.