Baking pays off for Saakane
Having acquired business skills, the youthful Gaone Saakane tried to look for a job but could not find one. She ended up working as a tutor but was lured into part time business for extra money. She is now running a small bakery, producing muffins, scones, mapakiwa and bottled ginger. Speaking to the Business Trends, Saakane said she started the business in July last year, producing at a small scale and selling to students and colleagues at work. “The salary I am earning is not enough to meet my needs so I decided to sell muffins to make extra money. The business is now growing and I am currently producing in large quantities,” said Saakane. Saakane studied Applied Business and Computing from Botswana Accountancy College (BAC) and graduated in 2016. She is working on registering a company and expanding the business to include producing cakes and more bakery products and beverages. “I am passionate about baking so I want to do it as a full time business.” She says starting up was not necessarily a challenge as she just used her personal resources to buy the ingredients. She started producing minimum of 40 muffins per day and currently makes 200 muffins per day. Most of her clients were students and teachers and few individuals but when she later started advertising through Facebook, more customers started to place some orders for formal events and parties. “Many customers including the corporate sector are now starting to call for orders,” Among the current challenges, Saakane says most customers demand a lot of discounts despite very low prices which are affecting profitability. She sells muffinsand scones at P2. 00 each. Bottled ginger starts from P4, 50 a small bottle to P300 for a 20-litter bucket.