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Founder and CEO of Sweet Sensation Confectionary Limited, a successful chain of Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) business in Nigeria, Mrs. Kehinde Kamson, shares insights on the secrets of succeeding in a highly competitive consumer market in Nigeria, while speaking at the Fidelity Bank SME forum on a recent radio programme. Festus Akanbi brings her comments Why did you go into business – Sweet Sensation in particular? How did it start?
It started because there was need for me to leave paid employment to better juggle all my responsibilities as a wife and mother. Prior to starting the business, I was a Chartered Accountant working for an oil service company in Victoria Island and living in Gbagada. I found myself popping babies almost every year. With my children’s school in Gbagada, I ended up leaving my children in the care of maids till very late at night, an arrangement I was not very comfortable with and which needed adjustment.
The adjustment needed to revolve around the home and environs for an all rounded solution to the problem. Also whatever business I was to do had to be food or food-related because that was where I had great strength. I’ve always had the passion for cooking, baking and food service generally. I liked to try out recipes and I had a mother who taught me same and she was a good example. So, with food as a primary focus and for which I had great passion, I took a leap of faith and a cake business began, later to unfold into a much wider product profile of snacks and meals. This is another point I would like to share with aspiring business people. It’s good to look for money and great profits, but it’s also good to satisfy your passion and enjoy the entertainment and fulfillment of soul, spirit and body while on your mission.
When you recognised the struggle between home front and office, why didn’t you go into setting up you own accounting firm?
If I went into accounting practice which would also have been fulfilling, I would have to be ready to visit clients all over the nooks and cranny of Lagos and in fact Nigeria. This would not provide the solution I very much desired for maternal support for my children. Moreover I did not think that I had acquired enough experience to start a practicing firm. We must realise that there is a set time and space for everything. At each point we all must be confident in ourselves and with our readiness for the next level. True, food business is not an easy one, but within the very limited options open to me, it was the only way to go. The entry requirements were not too heavy, the interest was strong, the energy was there, the competition in cakes was low, my spirit was high, and I was young and ready to go. I recognised some retail outlets that I could supply the cakes to, and with a mini business plan but very strategic one too, the business took off almost immediately.
Why did it take considerable time to open a Sweet Sensation outlet?
Well, that’s because every good thing has to start with some degree of experience and skill acquisition. The models for a full scale quick service restaurant only existed in Mr. Biggs then. All the newly upcoming brands built themselves over the years using their experience as their foundation. If we all had taken franchise from an international brand, their intellectual property and existing business model would have made it an easy ride. So there is a learning process for every truly Nigerian brand that cannot be compromised, and it comes with every territory and if you then patiently struggle through the process, you will come out strong.
Prior to starting the first Sweet Sensation outlet, what were you doing?
I had a production facility right at the back of my house. Thanks to my husband who allowed me a few excesses with home space. The production facility was partly at home and partly somewhere off University Road where a supporting retail outlet existed on the main road somewhere in Yaba, as well as in many kiosks in the university and all over Lagos. I later had to move the retail outlet to Town Planning way in Ilupeju where the very first Sweet sensation store emerged. It is interesting that this store was an expanded gate house, I mean security house of my parents’ home. As space demands increased for both production and sales, I found myself gradually taking over my parents’ house and our own house too. The gate house at my parents’ home elongated until it almost touched their entrance lobby, while the children’s play yard at the back of our house gradually gave in to a production shed that would extend each time my husband travelled out of the country.
In little or no time both locations were calling out for help as the invasion was real and offensive to privacy. This was indeed the reason why a next outlet was pursued vigorously and this was strategically designed for high-brow Victoria Island. The Adetokunbo Ademola street branch of Sweet Sensation was the second outlet for the brand. And many do not know that a preliminary ten years went into the back of the house elementariness before the Sweet Sensation brand emerged. This paved the way for me to successfully establish and grow the business.
When you look back on the humble beginnings of Sweet Sensation, what lesson do you want people to take away from it?
First of all, the start is always a struggle and I want to encourage all entrepreneurs to persevere because this initial stage is imperative and enables you learn the intricacies of business. We were lucky back then that the market was not particularly competitive as at the time I started. And I was young and full of ideas, I was also strong and passionate about whatever I did, and I had the support from my husband to do whatever I wanted to do to ensure I fulfilled my vision for the business. To cap it all God was on my side and strengthened me with a deep vision.
When is the right time to actually go into a business?
It depends on the type of maturity in terms of skill that your business choice requires. Some businesses may require extreme maturity and deep knowledge which one cannot easily attain except they are able to learn from a practitioner, a skill acquisition centre or an existing business model. Some business ideas are totally new and innovative and require creativity for modeling and delivery.
Raising very young children can slow the process of business initiation and development, but the strategy is to reach out to projects that are realisable within your constraints. For me I left a high paying job to come closer home and do a business that seemed demeaning at first but realisable. I needed to face reality. My colleagues were flying high in banks and financial institutions, sporting the corporate look and lifestyle while my aprons were all dirtied up from back house baking activity. But as our children grew up gradually, I could then leave them to helpers as a network of outlets splattered the map. Many will never know the challenges that lie behind sweet things. A visit to the dentist may begin to unveil them…..
Where is Sweet Sensation today, given the first outlet you established?
As said earlier the first outlet was the glorified gate-house of my late parents’ house which later was elevated to a much bigger facility next door. Today there are many branches all over Lagos and two in Ogun State and upcoming in Abuja. I must say that we are very cautious when it comes to expanding nationwide; and this is because multi-locational businesses are not very easy to manage especially with a very broad product profile of over 60 items produced fresh for immediate consumption on a daily basis. Foreign business models do not engage so many items.
Our business environment is also very difficult as energy and its related issues are overwhelming. Diesel remains a very serious contender with profits and more recently generator useful life is reduced to about one and a half years when these machines are working almost 24/7. Generator replacements have become a new scourge as many outlets record only about zero to two hours of electricity supply in a day and yet still receive high bills. Generators have become like tissue paper thereby almost eroding profits. Many practitioners are already closing down some of their outlets and adjusting their business models and structures. Some are also broadening the scope of their business to adopt activities that are not too energy dependent. You cannot know what is inside a book until it is read. This, I think, summarises the present state of the fast food industry. Pretty on the outside, groaning on the inside. Turnovers are not bad for the leading brands but there are too many contenders in operating costs.
How do you ensure consistency in quality?
One thing about operating a restaurant business is that it is almost inevitable that you have spices that cut across various menus. You must formulate standardised spices for each of your products so that there is not a hundred per cent dependence on the temperament of your workers. Having formulated the spices for all the product items, there will be some kind of consistency with taste but not necessarily with texture or visual appeal. There will always still be responsibilities that the staff members must shoulder but standardisation is key to consistency.
How do you manage competition?
Competition is the best thing that ever happened in any business environment. It keeps you on your toes and sets the tone for improvement. We deploy a lot of resources in studying our customers and our competition in this race to invade the hearts of our followers and even more. We visit and study our competitors just as they so the same. Our field force report that they run into fellow competitors on their intelligence assignments and get a good laugh when they recognise each other. I would say that competition fuels the business soul and is to the best advantage of the consumer. The only problem could be that these days, practitioners may gradually be crossing the line of healthy to unhealthy competition.
What are the challenges in the business that people should know, just in case they want to come into it?
There are a lot of challenges. And unfortunately, the people who are visioning this industry out there don’t see them. However, multi- locational businesses also have peculiar challenges apart from the energy and energy related problems earlier mentioned. The energy problem is also linked to damaging fixed assets and equipment. Real estate gets more expensive for the securing of good locations. High-brow rents have become a big challenge for sustenance.
The economic and social environment may take its toll on the workforce some of whom may become very aggressive especially in the area of integrity. Pricing cannot always address the problem with profitability as consumers are watching their pockets.
And while some are not, prices cannot be discriminating. New and smaller entrants stand a better chance with lower overheads as they have slimmer operations to manage and may not need a head office just yet.
For multi-location in your kind of business, what do you look out for in choosing a location?
Before the competition got stiff, people will locate any practitioner’s business wherever it is and wouldn’t care about the inconveniences getting there. Today, because there are many more operators, no matter how good your product offering is, if you are not conveniently located, then people will visit locations that are more conveniently located and closer to them. So today, we are careful about locations. We try to be at junctions, locations where the traffic or road median is not against us.
This is key. There is no assumed loyalty to your brand if you are not conveniently located.
How do you cope with the issue of good quality staff members?
The selection process is very intense, especially given the very demanding nature of the business. Our operating hours typically start at 7.00am and depending on the location, closing time can be between 9.30pm and 10.00pm, while in some very volatile locations between 7:30pm and 8:00pm. And so it is a shift business, the early morning shift closes by 2pm while the afternoon shift closes by 9/10 pm as the case may be.
So anyone who doesn’t want to work till as late as 10:00pm shouldn’t be in a Sweet Sensation or any hospitality business for that matter, because the shifts are reversed weekly.
How do you retain staff members?
We reward according to service over the years and do have staff members as old as 17 years in the business. We are 20 years this year and have a staff strength of over 2,200.We notice more stability in the kitchen staff members than in the front office where turnover is higher due majorly to people who think front office is for fancy or we on our part let go when they do not meet our expectations
At the interface level, you want to keep the best people and sometimes people do not demonstrate their inabilities at interviews. It is right there on the job that you begin to identify their inadequacies.
How do you ensure that every outlet is as good as the other?
Definitely, there is a predetermined standard for the organisation’s operations. So we strive to keep all outlets attractive but definitely, the older outlets with their different kinds of architecture may not be as appealing aesthetically and architecturally as the modern ones. There is therefore a phased kind of renovation that we deploy to aesthetically-deteriorating outlets that bring them closer to the realities of today. We therefore don’t accept a difference in ambiance across the outlets but we sometimes experience it and immediately swing to action. There is always room for improvement in our operations generally.
How do you handle the problem of negative competition?
We have built a reputation over the years through our flagship restaurants nationwide and banqueting services and corporate canteen services. Our customers come to us.
These are our strengths and we continue to leverage them. I will just like to encourage all budding entrepreneurs too diligently and patiently pursue their business dreams because it pays off in the long run.
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