House of Africa
Grace came to Sweden in 1998 and soon after getting settled, she was offered an internship at the Sheraton Hotel. She was taught the same skills that she obtained 25 years ago when she first started to work in a hotel, instead started to look for other options. Today she runs the store House of Africa in Katrineholm and has high expectations of expansion of the store in the near future.
Grace has her roots from the countryside in Kenya. Her business life began very early; her family opened a small shop in one of the houses on their farm. Her mother had a group of women she supervised and together they opened a store. Grace was just seven years when the shop opened, and she often helped and learned how to run a store.
After much success with the store, the women wanted to move forward individually. When they discussed this with Grace mother, she offered to buy the store and the inventory that was left.
The shop was now owned by the family which gave Grace a greater responsibility. Grace attended school during daytime and during the evenings she worked in the shop. The store had created a great business interest for Grace and her new goal in life was to become a successful businesswoman. Therefore, she decided to study hotel management and as a result she got a job at Inter Continental Hotel.
Inter-Continental Hotel chose to invest in Grace and paid for a trainee education. She was soon promoted to Trainee Assistant, and with this position she got to travel to all countries in Africa where Inter-Continental was operating. In Nairobi, she started a side project where she had a kiosk that sold goods that were taken from the rural side into town.
Her business life in Sweden began with buying old tractors and exporting them to farmers in Kenya. This went on for four years. Then she began to collect second hand clothes and send them to Kenya. When she finished with the clothes, she started to import small items from Kenya, which she then sold in different markets with the help of Kenyan embassy. Through this she managed to travel to different cities in Sweden, selling African products while marketing Kenya.
Her plan to start a shop was always in her mind. First time Grace contacted NEEM, which later started the project MFI, was in 2006. Grace and MFI began its long process of business development, coaching, business planning and to make contact with banks and authorities for various permits. Grace was constantly rejected by banks when she applied for a loan.
In April 2010 Grace went to the bank to get a loan of 150 000. The bank denied the loan arguing that they do not believe that Grace has the capacity to can run a store. Together with MFI other banks where approached and finally Grace managed to secure a loan.
Now the store has been open and it is already obvious that Grace is very business oriented. Grace tells us that she desire to have a bigger shop, and have included that in her plans. Grace want to prove to the banks that there are many other women who are in similar situation and with a small loan they can successfully operate a business.
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