When she first joined SHOFCO's Group Savings and Loans (GSL) in 2011, Joan Adhiambo, a mother of 3, had very little sewing knowledge.
Through the Economic Empowerment Program’s Entrepreneurship classes, she improved her sewing skills and learned how to make a number of things. The first loan that she took out from her GSL group helped her buy the bottom piece of a sewing machine. She later received a Kiva Zip Loan with which she bought the rest of the sewing machine, a few pieces of fabric, and rented a space to start her own tailoring business.
The entrepreneurship class helped her to make her business successful. She says that she learned how to run an effective business and make it grow with lessons on record-keeping, costing, cash flow management and long-term business planning. She adds that without these lessons, she would be running a struggling business where she would probably not be able to understand the difference between earned sales and profit.
Joan says that part of the reason her business is doing very well is because she is diversifying her product delivery by reaching out to customers in GSL groups instead of waiting for people to visit her shop.
Her tailoring business has had a huge impact on more than just her life. Now she is able to pay for her children’s school fees and feed them on three balanced meals a day as opposed to before when her family would have to forgo either lunch or supper. She now sees a bright future ahead for her kids because she knows that she can now afford to transition them through school and on to tertiary learning.
Before coming to SHOFCO, Joan says that she did not think that her kids would be able to get out of the slum.