Bonfire Adventures boss Simon Kabu has shared how he struggled to earn an income before starting the tour company alongside his ex-wife, Sarah Kabu.
In a post on his Facebook page, Kabu shared an old photo from his days as a tout plying the Githurai 44 route. He revealed that he took the job to raise university fees, highlighting financial constraints in his family.
“#tbt when I was a makanga at route44 to get university fees instead of dropping out of school. What’s that one thing you did that makes you who you are now?” he wrote.
In a past interview, he revealed that he went to Kagumo High School for his secondary education before proceeding to pursue a bachelor’s degree in Economics from Egerton University.
While in the third year, his parents could not afford college fees, forcing him to do menial jobs, including selling pirated movies, cooking at a local food kiosk, to make extra money.
Amid the hustles, Simon met Sarah through young professionals google chat group and one year she would later become his wife after a get together at Lukenya excursion.
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The two were among the few members who volunteered to handle logistics for the group’s physical get-together at Lukenya.
As more events followed, Sarah and Simon would become the defacto logisticians for the group, a task that took a lot of their time and effort.
“Every time we organized an event, it would turn out so well. With time, we realized that the planning was taking up a lot of our time and energy, and we began charging a fee. Even then, the turn-up was still high, and one time over a bonfire at Maasai Mara Game Reserve, Sarah and I mulled over the idea of turning it into a business,” Kabu recalled.
The two later got a referral to organize a business trip for a company, marking the birth of Bonfire Adventures.
Kabu revealed that the corporate client insisted on dealing with a registered company that would be paid via a bank cheque, forcing them to quickly register their business.
“We quickly searched for availability of the business name and registered a company. The funny thing is we had to keep the cheque for over three months because we did not have a bank account! That’s how Bonfire Adventures was born,” he added.
Being an extroverted salesman, Kabu worked on onboarding more clients with a focus on international tourists and corporate clients.
On the other hand, Sarah, who has a background in business management, was instrumental in planning clients’ itineraries, coordinating tour drivers’ schedules, liaising with host hotels, booking air tickets, and organizing timely pick-ups and drop-offs.
A few years into the business, Bonfire Adventures had daily trips to the Maasai Mara Game Reserve, with most domestic tourists using their services.
Today, the company has a turnover of over a billion Kenyan shillings and has created over 200 job opportunities.
