A commercial oven and mixers to expand my bakery business

Christine

Nairobi, Kenya

32% repaid

Entrepreneur

Name

Christine

Member since

March 2017

On-time repayments

55 installments  •  35%

About Me

I am a home baker. I am married with nine children. I live with all of them including my husband. All of our children are in school. I am a stay-at-home mom who bakes to make money on the side. I bake using a charcoal burner for now, as I cannot afford the price of a gas oven.

The challenge with this is that when I get more than one order, I cannot bake them at the same time. I have to bake the cakes one by one. One time, I got three orders on the same day and had to forfeit two night's sleep because my charcoal burner can only bake one cake at a time. Another challenge is I cannot expand as quickly as I want to. I want to go into the whole range of baked goods and sweets but I find myself limited by my equipment.

A gas oven would go a long way in allowing me to expand my home business and hopefully make more profits. This, in turn, will help improve the quality of life for my family and ease the expenses overall of our family.

My Business

I bake cakes for all occasions: birthdays, weddings, anniversaries and any sort of celebration, including a 5-tier wedding cake I delivered to my client. So far, the business manages to pay bills and put food on the table even with limited equipment. I love baking, a trait I inherited from my grandfather who used to bake bread and supply to schools. My revenues vary from month to month, but on a good month I can make $500. After removing running costs for baking materials, the rest goes into school fees for the children. I find that I cannot expand as I would like because after paying fees, nothing is left over.

Loan Proposal

The loan is basically to buy commercial equipment such as a commercial oven, additional mixers and other baking equipment in order to increase sales.

I would also like to set up a website to market my cakes and be able to take orders online. This would greatly enhance sales by almost double.

I would also like eventually to build an additional kitchen to cater for my baking business.

Show original English  

About Me

I am a home baker. I am married with nine children. I live with all of them including my husband. All of our children are school. I am a stay at home mom who bakes to make some extra money on the side. I bake using a charcoal burner for now as I cannot afford the price of a gas oven.

The challenge with this is that when I get more than one order, I cannot bake them at the same time. I have to bake the cakes one by one. One time I got three orders on the same day and had to forfeit two night's sleep because my charcoal burner can only bake one cake at a time. Another challenge is I cannot expand as quickly as I want to. I want to go into the whole range of baked goods and sweets but I find myself limited by equipment.

A gas oven would go a long way in making me expand my home business and hopefully make more profits. This in turn will help improve the quality of life for my family and ease the expenses overall of our family.

My Business

I bake cakes for all occasions. Birthdays, weddings, anniversaries and any sort of celebration. I have been in the baking business for 4 years now. The picture up here shows a 5-tier wedding cake I was delivering to my client. So far the business manages to pay bills and put food on the table even with limited equipment. I love baking a trait I inherited from my grandfather who used to bake bread and supply to schools. My revenues vary from month to month but on a good month I can make $500. I bake at least 4 cakes every month, at an average cost of $20 each. I do at least 1 wedding a month at the cost of $250. After removing running costs for baking materials the rest goes into school fees for the children. I find that I cannot expand as I would like because after paying fees nothing is left over.

With this loan I would:

- purchase a gas oven at $539.90.
- refill gas cylinder with gas at $30.
- buy two additional extra large baking tins at $30.
- mini kitchen scale at $35.
- kitchen mixer at $359.95

Total cost: $994.85

Loan Proposal

The loan is basically to buy commercial equipment such as a commercial oven, additional mixers and other baking equipment in order to increase sales.

With this loan I would:

- purchase a gas oven at $539.90.
- refill gas cylinder with gas at $30.
- buy two additional extra large baking tins at $30.
- mini kitchen scale at $35.
- kitchen mixer at $359.95

Total cost: $994.85

I would also like to set up a website to market my cakes and be able to take orders online. This will greatly enhance sales by almost double, but this I will do in the near future.

I would also like to build an additional kitchen to cater for my baking business, which I will also do in the near future.

Feedback

None

None

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Loan Info

Project Type

Classic Loan

Disbursed amount

$986.00

Date disbursed

May 15, 2017

Repayment status

Late

Projected term

11 months

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Ask Christine a question about this project, share news and photos of your own, or send a simple note of thanks or inspiration.

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  • Christine    Oct 18, 2018

    I will make a payment on October 27, if you could please give me a few days to get the money

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  • Christine    Nov 14, 2017

    Please bear with me for a while. I have not been meeting my financial committment due to illness. My business has suffered due to that. I also take care of my ageing parents who also require my constant input. However, I will soon resume payments again. I am starting to revamp again. Sorry for the silence.

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  • Silas    Nov 14, 2017

    She has promised to go on with repayement soon. She has faced financial crisis due to ilness

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  • Christine    Sep 8, 2017

    please bear with me. I have not remitted payments for two weeks. My parents were taken ill and it took quite a toll on me financially. I will resume soon enough

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  • Christine    May 30, 2017

    I would like to reduce to 2,000 weekly, and will increase as the days go by.

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  • Christine    May 24, 2017

    A big thank you to all my lenders. The loan of $950 was disbursed to me. I have finally gotten the oven I wanted, along with 2 extra large baking tins and a mixer. My family was overjoyed with the purchase and look forward to more cakes and sweets. I am able to bake cookies something which I was not able to do before. Thank you once again to all my lenders. May God bless you all abundantly.

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  • Christine    May 15, 2017

    Thank you to all my lenders. I have received the full amount of Ksh 95,000. I will now go and buy my oven of which I will duly inform my lenders.

    Thank you very much once again. God Bless You!

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  • Christine    May 12, 2017

    Thank you to all my lenders. I can't thank you enough for your good gestures.

    With this loan I will:

    - purchase a gas oven at $539.90.
    - refill gas cylinder with gas at $30.
    - buy two additional extra large baking tins at $30.
    - mini kitchen scale at $35.
    - kitchen mixer at $359.95

    Total cost: $994.85

    May God bless you abundantly.

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  • Christine    May 12, 2017

    Hi,

    - John Minges
    - Dan Brinkman
    - Emily

    Thank you very much! God bless you!

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  • Christine    May 11, 2017

    To:
    - Alberto Cereser
    - Joseph Hwang
    - GS2
    - Ashira Blazer
    - Marcus Oppolzer
    - Ruth FT
    - ChrisF
    - Elise E

    Thank you all very much. May Almighty God bless you abundantly.

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  • Christine    May 11, 2017

    Thank you Macsen. God bless you!

    Log in to reply • Share
  • Christine    May 11, 2017

    Thank you and may God bless you abundantly:

    - iggwag
    - Shena
    - Manaal Eisa
    - Anja Fechtig
    - Walter Clarke
    - Alex Brennan

    Log in to reply • Share
  • Christine    May 10, 2017

    Many thanks:
    - Flipmore
    - Judy K
    - Atheist4good

    God Bless you

    Log in to reply • Share
  • Christine    May 10, 2017

    Many thanks,

    - Johannes
    - Boysenfam
    - Madeleine

    God Bless you.

    Log in to reply • Share
  • Christine    May 9, 2017

    With this loan I would:

    - purchase a gas oven at $539.90.
    - refill gas cylinder with gas at $30.
    - buy two additional extra large baking tins at $30.
    - mini kitchen scale at $35.
    - kitchen mixer at $359.95

    Total cost: $994.85

    Log in to reply • Share
  • Christine    May 9, 2017

    Thank you Cloudways. GOD BLESS YOU!

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  • Christine    May 9, 2017

    Hi Shena,

    I understand your curiosity. I applied for my first loan and was lucky enough to have it fully funded within an hour. The entire amount went into the Member's Loan Fund in order to increase my loan limit second time round. What was reimbursed to me was Sh 400, the equivalent of $4 which is not even enough to buy a charcoal burner. The Zidisha team advised me to return the Sh 400, which I did, and apply for my second loan as indicated. That is why I still haven't acquired that much needed gas oven.

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  • shena    May 9, 2017

    Hi Christine,
    I see your previous loan was repaid early. Congratulations! However I am confused, as the purpose of the previous loan was to get a gas oven and in this proposal you don't seem to have one and are still cooking with charcoal. Was the previous proposal accidentally repeated on the web site?

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  • Christine    May 8, 2017

    Many thanks:

    - Daniel Hammarberg
    - Freewolf
    - Anita K
    - Kiva Club

    May God bless you abundantly!

    Log in to reply • Share
  • Christine    May 7, 2017

    Many thanks:

    - Tullio
    - Frederik Borg Dunge
    - Dwener

    May God Bless you!

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