It’s good to start small and grow – Mrs Tosin Olabintan
By Ebele Orakpo
For any nation’s economy to grow, the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) sector must play a pivotal role in the overall industrial economy of the nation and Nigeria is not an exception.
Tosin Olabintan....you must know your job more than your employees otherwise...
The entrepreneurs are only asking government to provide the necessary infrastructure. In a recent chat with Vanguard in her office in Ilupeju, Lagos, Mrs Tosin Olabintan, the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of Hi Stakes Ventures, an outfit that specialises in corporate and individual gift items, promotional etc., says gifts business is an art abnd not an all-comers affair. Excerpts:
Apart from her first de-gree in Mass Communi-cation from the University of Lagos, an MBA from Business School of Netherlands and a certificate in Entrepreneurial management from thePan-African UniversityLagos Business School, Mrs. Tosin Olabintan has gone for several courses and is in partnership with the Entrepreneurial Development Programme of Pan-Africa University Lagos Business School. She is a mentee of Faith Foundation.
Speaking on her choice of business line, Mrs Olabintan said: “I cannot start talking about my business without talking about where I started from. During my youth service in Ogun State, I worked as a journalist with Sketch Newspapers and Daily Times. I was posted to the Governor’s office. At that time, Governor Raji Rasaki was the one in power so we would go for village square meetings in all those rough terrains. I believe that experience really helped me.”
After her youth service, she got a job with the Directorate for Social Mobilisation (MAMSER) as First Information Officer. “God gave me the grace and I was able to apply what my lecturers taught me in school because during the SAP riots, I was at our Yaba head office, our director, the late Captain Wole Bucknor was not on seat and the riot was so intense in Lagos that policemen were pulling off their uniforms to avoid being attacked by rioters. Gen. Ibrahim Babangida was head of state at that time. Because of what MAMSER stood for, we had to say something and my immediate boss was not around and something had to be done. NTA 7 was close by so as the Information Officer, I drafted a press release, just to ensure that we calmed the nerves of both parties and because of that release, there was calm. The president was impressed and called my captain to tell him so. My captain had to ask who did the release and he was told I did it and because of that, he made sure I was on hot beats. I believe I thrive where there are positive challenges,” she narrated.
When she left MAMSER, Mrs Olabintan moved to the financial sector, first as an Investment broker (a portfolio manager) with the International Trust Company until she started the business and parenting and had to take out some time to take care of the homefront.
She later joined a mortgage bank before the banks started having problems.”That was during Gen. Sani Abacha’s regime and I said to myself: ‘This is the right time to start something on my own.’ I have always had passion for making people around me happy and I knew that no matter what, if you give out gifts to people, you put a smile on their faces, even if it’s not what they want at that point in time, they will smile even if they don’t utter a word. That goes a long way because I believe a smile can make a person’s day and so I decided to go into the business. Before this time, a lot of friends and family members will come to me to seek advice on the kinds of gift items to get for various occasions. I said there is something in me that these people are seeing that I have not recognised. So I sat back and asked myself if I really have a passion for giving gifts and I discovered that yes, it is something I can never get tired of doing because there will always be a reason to give. If you don’t give something tangible, you give something intangible like a smile or affection and because it is a gift too, you will be able to identify what you will give to somebody and the person will appreciate it,“she said.
Continuing she said: “I started the business from my home and I started with gifts to individuals – friends and family and then there was a bank that set up close to my house so I just walked in there and found favour. I started doing business with them. From that bank, I moved outside the shores of Nigeria doing corporate gifts for clients in places like Cotonou, Lome, Burkina Faso etc. From corporate gifts, we went into promotional. Now we do party gifts because we do wholesale. We also do branding. If you are looking for any gift for any occasion, we have it.”
Today, the little acorn seed has become a mighty oak, offering a means of livelihood to so many people, including interns from tertiary institutions.
“It’s good to start small and grow, you can’t start walking the first day you were born, there is a process that must be followed. I am still a work in progress. When I started, I’d be in a bus going somewhere and then I’d see a signage of an organisation, I’ll take note of it and later go there to see the corporate affairs person and negotiate business,“ she stated. Speaking further, Olabintan said the company is in partnership with manufacturers and also into merchandising. “We help clients get whatever they want, and give to them at manufacturer’s price and then charge them only for services rendered. “
Although the outfit which also deals in brand/engraving designs, heat transfers, mesh-making and screen printing, employs several people “ but most of the time, we outsource to cut down cost. We have in-house visualisers but then we bring in the boys who run the machines because we have all the machines.”
Contrary to popular belief that gifts business is not a big deal, and that anyone who can shop for her household can do it, Olabintan says it is an art. “There is a difference between somebody who just does gifts and someone who is a professional in the art. We have an eye for detail. We know what a brand is all about. It’s not just ‘oh, we want biros, supply us biros. No. It’s about ‘we want biros that will match this brand’ and it is our responsibility to go out and give you a biro that will suit your brand without you being there. That’s what makes the difference. Apart from the physical item, what about the branding? We know what your colour, font and type face mean to you and we can’t play with them, they are your identity,” she said.
On the challenges faced by the business, she said the major challenge in Nigeria is human capital, “you must know your job more than your employees otherwise you will be messed up big time! Know your area of core competence because that is the passion that drives a business. Outsource to professionals in areas you are not competent and limit your overhead.” Epileptic power supply is another challenge but the company boasts of a 70KVA generator although they spend about N70,000 on fuel monthly.
The Hi Stakes Ventures boss said she has been able to grow the business to this point because she was able to draw a line between business and family/friends. “You must let them understand that this is business,” she stated.
