Kuku Choma Business: Written by Kyrgitt Kalya and published with his permission: Last evening, I dropped a friend to get his car at Nairobi West. As he went to get it, lingered around waiting for him to confirm everything was okay and I spent the next few minutes tempting my taste buds which had been awoken by the aroma of china grill out there on the street.
So I walked out of my car to see if I could get a sumptuous bite of choma sausage ( Mwanaume ni kukula kwa street). As I was there, I was impressed at the traffic of clients the vendor was handling. People in cars were stopping by for take aways , nearby drunkards were lining up staggered almost falling on the grill, passersby and all.
When it was my turn, as he cut some ‘nyamscious’ piece of grilled steak for me to taste, I struck conversation with him. I asked him how business was.
Jobless? How you can make Sh. 100,000 if you have Sh. 15,000 capital
As usual, in Kenyan fashion, he started grumbling about everything from Covid-19 to potholes on the road, to BBI to the weather to his ex girlfriend who ran away with his landlord to Trump destroying the American dream… He went all over the place before he answered me straight.
“Boss, so unauza kuku ngapi kwa siku?”
“Aah skuizi biashara ni mbaya sana. Tuna survive tu”.
I gave up, he wasn’t going to tell me. Then I decided to buy a full chicken from him. Some 3 young men waiting their turn for choma sausages came and I asked them to take as many as they wanted because I’d pay for it.
Muthomi, the vendor, lit up his face
“Wewe ni roho safi sana. Umeniinua na umejenga hao majamaa…”
I told him I like seeing hustlers like him because they motivate me to work hard as well.
“Hapa nauza kuku full 20 kwa siku ikiharibika ni 15 hapo, lakini kitambo ilikua inafika hata 35. Nauza sausage one pack hivi na steak nauza kilo 6 hivi”
Now he was opening up.
Nyama unatoa wapi. I asked him.
He pointed to a butchery behind him where he bought his steak at 300 a KG and he told me of a supplier he had who sold him chicken at 500. He bought the sausages from the supermarket.
He wasn’t even buying cheaply from source. So, was he making money?
He sold quarter grilled chicken at 200 bob.
Sausage at 100bob.
Beef stake at 200 bob a quarter piece.
I did quick maffs.( Skriaappp)
If he sold 20 kukus, he had a profit of 300 per chicken which translates to 6k a day.
He sold 6 kgs of steak an evening at a profit of 500 bob per kg which translates to 3k a day.
He bought the sausages at 600 bob which has 30 pieces. At 100 shillings he made a profit of 2400 a day.
His total daily profit, from his narration, was 11,400.
Using this basic arithmetic, I deduced that he paid food permit license for 700 bob. He also may have health permit, and maybe paid the bar behind him something small for standing there. Let’s guess this figure to be 3k.
He bought a grill at 5k and maybe a sack of charcoal every week at 1k.
As you do that math, his profit before extra overheads above comes to 11,400
He potentially makes 296,400 in 26 days.
Even if you argued much about other expenses, he still can potentially make 200k a month standing there.
I drove off respecting Jerald Muthomi. He has been there many years, and I now understand why.
Some businesses are not meant for scaling. They are meant to be sustainable and consistent.
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