The #RedNotebookChat — Tweetchats are back and we held one last Friday. The tweetchats provide a platform for entrepreneurs and founders to share their knowledge and experience in; starting and running businesses or organisations and the challenges and lessons that come with the process. Through these tweetchats, we are able to look into entrepreneurs’ and founders’ “Red notebooks” and learn from their experiences.
In this #RedNotebookChat, we featured David Okwii, the founder and manager of Odukar Store and he shared his experience on starting and running an online electronics and tech accessories shop amid the internet access challenges.
Odukar Store is an online shop that provides or sells electonic accessories or tech that helps you lead a healthy and productive lifestyle. The store also has a physical shop located in Kampala, Ntinda Tuskys Building 3rd floor.
David shared the story behind the store and here is the full conversation.
DISCLAIMER: The responses in this article were directly extracted from Twitter and may contain shorthand or errors due to the rapid nature of the tweetchat.
Tell us a little about yourself.
I am David Okwii, internet entrepreneur, blogger and software developer. Co-founder @Dignited and @odukarstore. Coffee enthusiast, runner and subsistence farmer.
What inspired Odukar Store and what is the meaning behind the name?
Duuka is bantu word which means shop. Odukar roughly translates “at the shop” in Ateso. The inspiration behind the store is my passion for Tech and making it accessible locally. I started by creating content around Tech, but that wasn’t enough.
The missing link was always making these authentic products available on the local market. This is what @odukarstore aims to achieve.
As an online platform, what are some of the highs and lows you have experienced so far?
The Highs;
- Making money in my sleep
- Waking up to fulfill orders
- Flexible working hours
- Working from home
- Serving happy customers.
The Lows;
- Internet shutdowns
- Mindless policies from arm-chair bureaucrats and politicians
- Low demand for products
- Being depressed
- Being broke sometimes
Have you had any specific challenges with internet around service delivery?
- Unexpected internet shutdowns and censorship really frustrates and hinders growth of online businesses such as ours.
- Logistics, especially last mile delivery, is still a challenge. Covid-19 curfews restrict working hours and therefore delivery times.
How have you been able to work around this?
Allow for offline channels such as phone calls or physical location. Customers can make orders through phone calls. They can inquire for products and pricing.
What do you know now about business that you didn’t know back when you started?
- Ideas are cheap, execution is everything.
- E-commerce is very much a brick-and-mortar game. A lot of it heavily depends on the real world.
- Supply chain is a mystery in this country. Everyone closely guards their supplier or sourcing.
- Customs and taxation very much depends on who your provider is even if it’s supposed to be a standard.
- You don’t necessarily need a physical store to run an online business. Save the rent for for customer experience.
How do you ensure that your business is safe, trusted and accessible?
My team is very solid. They are talented and professional right from the delivery guys.
Friendly and responsive customer care and support makes your business very accessible to anyone and eventually builds trust.
We take time to source the right products. We use them ourselves, so we are aware of the issues even before customers do.
Do you have any experience with registering and formalizing businesses that upcoming entrepreneurs should take seriously?
Find a way of validating your idea without registering a company.
Splitting 50/50 on company shares is never a good idea.
Don’t rush to register a company right away unless the nature of what you do requires it from the very start. It’s better to bootstrap your startup under the arms of an existing legal entity to remove the friction of deciding ownership of the business upfront among partners.
Tell us about the five biggest challenges in your operations.
- Cash is king but very expensive to manage. A lot of leakages when transactions are mostly based on cash.
- Still no flawless implementation of online transactions payments yet. Mobile Money is cheap but liquidation via withdrawal is super expensive.
- Even same-day delivery is not good enough. Customers expect “real-time delivery” — at the most 1 hour tops. We just don’t have the infrastructure and platforms to make this happen, so always having “delivery pressure”.
- Takes time to get the right online distribution and marketing channel. Google/SEO takes time, Facebook is blocked, your website barely gets visited by even returning customers.
- Shipping and customs is very variable. It all depends on who your provider is.
Given the ‘Hustle Hard’ culture, how do you plan for rest and life outside work?
I work from home, so splitting home/work is tricky. I normally have home workouts and jogging in the evening at least twice a week.
Weekends are reserved for social and family occasions. It’s a de-stressing opportunity.
What has been your toughest failure so far and how were you able to move past it?
Scaling: It’s not much as a failure as it is a challenge. Your growth until you hit a certain ceiling beyond which you can’t punch through in our market. Scale is a function of many thgs including product/market fit, raising funding, market size, team composition etc.
I am still struggling with this one. It’s a continuous learning process.
What exciting plans do you have for the future?
I am always optimistic about the future even without knowing what it holds. We want to make Tech more accessible to more people, esp Kids to make them more prepared for the coming Techno-heavy future and to make them competitive in the global economy.
We want to innovate or at least be part of the innovations around platforms and infrastructure that will make e-commerce work flawlessly for anyone such as last mile delivery, payments, customer loyalty progs etc.
