The educational system in Kenya traditionally encourages young people to pursue studies with the expectation that they will secure a job upon completion.
Often there is limited emphasis on equipping the upcoming generation with the knowledge to manouvre the entrepreneurship landscape. Many with entrepreneurial dreams often find the journey challenging as it is often marked by trial and error.
When Anne Muhia decided to take over an ongoing butchery business in Hurlingham, little did she anticipate that this venture would become a thorn in her side just a few weeks after opening it.
Annie took to TikTok to share her story, revealing that she lost Sh. 300,000 within a mere month of taking over the existing retail business.
“The character development in Nairobi will show you things,” she said.
Anne assumed control of the business in 2020, a period during which she was heavily pregnant. This made it difficult for her to be consistently present at the business, so she decided to hire a friend to assist in managing the day-to-day operations.
“I want business owners to understand that retail business carries the biggest risks, especially in Inventory Management,” she said.
Neither Anne nor her friend had any prior experience in running a butchery business. They did it blindly. The employees at the butchery knew this and used it as an upper hand to exploit the newbies.
During their weekly stock-taking process, Anne noticed a discrepancy in the inventory receipts. It indicated that something was amiss in the business’s financial records.
When Anne confronted the employees about the discrepancy, they explained that there was “weight loss,” which didn’t quite make sense to her.
“I would ask them and they would tell me its weight loss (shrinkage). Ati unajua kuku inatoa maji.”
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Her 6th sense strongly suggested that something was not right in the business, and she was determined to get to the bottom of it.
Anne decided to employ a mystery shopper who would purchase items from each of her three employees while they were on duty. A mystery shopper is a market researcher who pretends to be a customer in business to evaluate customer service and other factors.
“With that, I was able to narrow it down to who was doing it (stealing). There was one guy who was nyoroshaing me. I reported the issue to Kilimani police station,” she said.
When the police arrived at the shop, the employee involved in the theft fled. The cops could not match his pace.
“If you are probably wondering if your employees are stealing from you, they probably are. Especially if you’re in retail and business,” she maintained.
Weeks later, after counting her losses, Anne decided to dust up and start afresh with some funds she had saved. Later, she came to discover that the stealing employee would open shop early at 6 a.m. to sell Anne’s stock. The official business opening time was 9 am.
“I found out that he would come early in the morning and supply certain restaurants with chicken. This is how I lost Sh. 300,000 worth of inventory,” she stated.
Coincidentally, Anne had a mutual friend who operated a restaurant and was unknowingly purchasing meat from the thief, completely unaware that the money used to buy the meat was the result of theft.
“He told me he buys chicken from me; obviously not me Anne, not me my business, they buy from someone else.”
This is often the unspoken side of entrepreneurship that many are not informed of when starting a business. It is a real pandemic in small businesses.
To mitigate such risks, Anne decided to install CCTV cameras to monitor the business while she was at home caring for her newborn
She also implemented an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system and separated the roles of cashier, inventory manager and butcher.