Printer, plastic chairs and computer for my cybercafe

Brian

Kapsabul, Kenya

100% repaid

Entrepreneur

Name

Brian

Member since

June 2015

On-time repayments

248 installments  •  17%

About Me

Am at my last stages of the 8-4-4 system. I studied my primary education in a local school then after passing my examinations was admitted to high school. Thought my high school I had a passion in computers. I took computer studies as my technical subject of which I passed well in my KCSE exams. I managed to secure an admission to join a public university through a regular programme. Being in the university opened up my mind, having friends and company of business minded people. This saw me to coming up with several business ideas that I could do in order to sustain my school life. In my 1st year I used to deliver food to students' hostels at a small fee, this was my first experience in business. And after being in the business for a while I was able to gain more knowledge on the dos and donts in business, how to attract more customers, branding and how to retain customers. Later in my second year I managed to start a cyber cafe around the school, this was possible through the savings that I had accumulated from my first business. What I can say is that the journey has not been smooth, sometimes I found myself running at a loss. An example is when there were few customers that could not even make you pay the bills. So occasionally I had to inject a few coins to sustain the business running. What's interesting in this country is the passion that the youth have towards their financial success, and how their dreams drive them to fight harder to make it a reality. One of my hobbies is going through the internet learning new things, this has made me to widen my scope to seeing the future on an international level.

My Business

After my first business I decided to venture into a new business and test my creative strength and ability to make a reality out of a dream. What drove me into deciding to start a cyber cafe was the demand for students in the university to do online research, print their work, connect to friends and other students from all over. I realised that it would be a very lucrative business and I would have helped solve a problem. Since the students crowd in the few cafes that are available and thus cannot do their work peacefully and conviniently. Another major reason why I chose the business is because of the capital that I needed in order to start. The savings that I had was enough to rent a space and buy few computers to start. At first I had three client computers. As the business progressed I was able to purchase a small printer. This helped increase the services that I could offer to the clients. I was now able to offer internet access and printing services. What keeps my customers coming back is the competitive rates that I offer. They are so low that they attract more customers yet more to keep the business running as still keep some as savings. My current objective is to keep reinvesting in the business by buying more computers, chairs and a bigger printer. This will help grow my business. And after being introduced to zidisha by a friend I realised that their aim was to boost small entrepreneurs andI could grow my business at a faster rate. I decided that it was the next step for my business. The loan will help me acquire more equipments thus translating to a bigger business.

Loan Proposal

The loan will help me to acquire the following for my cybercafe:
-4 chairs each will cost 10 dollars
-a printer which will cost 50 dollars
This will be a boost to my cybercafe business because it will have help to add the service of printing to the existing list of services we initially had. The chairs will also help to make the customers comfortable as they wait to be served. Either when waiting for documents to be printed or while queing to access the internet. Thus the customers will not get tired and displeased by standing for longer time to be served. This will be a boost to our marketing strategy since customers comfort will make our market spread by word of mouth. The chairs will not be a source of direct revenue to the business but will be a source of marketing and also act as stock for future expansion of the business. The printer on the other hand will be generating direct income from printing of clients documents. A breakdown on the likely expenditure and income from the printer from printing a ream of papers.
-ream of papers-3$
-electricity-1$
-ink-1$
-general maintence-1$
Total:-6$
Income generated from printing documents equal to a ream of papers.
-printing 1 page-sh 5
Total:-5x400: sh2000
This comes to approximately 24dollars
When converted to percentage it is a whooping 300 percent profit.

Feedback

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Loan Info

Project Type

Classic Loan

Disbursed amount

$100.00

Date disbursed

Jul 21, 2015

Repayment status

On Time

Projected term

8 months

Other loans

Lenders

PG

Paul Graham

United States

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  • Brian    Nov 11, 2020

    Its been awhile since i have posted in this forum. Good news is that i have undergone major transformation over the years. I have since graduated from university, rebuilt the business and even started a second venture. I am glad to inform my lenders that i am back on track with repayment and will be clearing my loan balance in afew days. The future is very promising

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  • Brian    Sep 7, 2016

    i would like to apologize to my lenders for not being up to date on my repayment. the reason i was not able to continue my payment was because of unforeseen challenges that faced my business. the premises that i had set up my cyber cafe was burnt to ashes by an accidental fire caused by faulty electrical connections in the adjacent premise. i am now working with the owner of the premises to see how to reestablish the business. i wish to notify my lenders that i will resume my repayments as per the schedule as soon as i recover from my losses. i sincerely apologize and thank you for the patience.

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    • Matt B    Sep 7, 2016

      Brian - thanks for the update. There's no need to apologize - it was clearly beyond your control and these things can happen. I hope you are able to get your business back up and running soon.

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  • Brian    Jun 24, 2016

    making myself comfortable to avoid skipping repayments.

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  • Brian    Jun 13, 2016

    am now able to pay more because the business is picking up after a hit.

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  • Brian    May 2, 2016

    i am waiting for the services to pick up.

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  • Brian    Apr 11, 2016

    I would like to thank the lenders for the support. I will use the money to purchase the binding and lamination machine then improve the Internet speeds to attract more customers. This will help me increase my profits and also improve service delivery to the customers. I truly appreciate your assistance and promise to do my best.

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  • Matt B    Apr 10, 2016

    I hope your loan gets fully funded. Best wishes, Matt in England.

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  • Brian    Apr 10, 2016

    sometimes all you need to give is love. spent my weekend with orphaned children. it felt really good and i hope that someday i will be able to do more.

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  • Brian    Mar 28, 2016

    I would like to thank zidisha for the help that they gave me. I was able to use the funds I got to acquire new equipments and now my cybercafe is making more profit and helping many people and fellow students complete their tasks with ease. I would like to further expand my cyber cafe and improve the internet speeds to make it more competitive and attractive to the customers. Zidisha is the best patner, if I can say so, that has helped me to achieve now what I was looking towards in the near future. I would like to encourage also all entrepreneurs to make use of zidisha to grow themselves and their community. Thanks a lot.

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  • Brian    Mar 26, 2016

    I want to clear so that I can qualify for a higher loan to be able to expand my business more

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  • Brian    Mar 4, 2016

    The business is picking up and I am planning to expand.

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  • Brian    Feb 27, 2016

    Just for a short time

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  • Brian    Feb 10, 2016

    the business is picking up well

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  • Brian    Jan 23, 2016

    My business is stabilizing.

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  • Brian    Nov 8, 2015

    Reducing for a while, due to unavoidable circumstances.

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