GET THIRSTY!
Young entrepreneurs from inner cities urged to innovate
SPEAK TO Victoria, a mother who related her story recently at a forum in the inner-city community of Seaview Gardens in St Andrew, and you’ll recognise just how natural innovation comes to many Jamaicans.
The savvy mother, who was marginally employed, found an interesting way to “churn” her own income, after she bought a washing machine on hire purchase to assist with her household chores, but was not entirely sure how she would pay for it.
“I trust a machine from Courts, and I’m here now saying, ‘How am I going to pay for this machine?’ I need some money to come in and help to pay for it,” she said, as she pondered one day at home.
And, then she had an epiphany, “It just popped in my head: ‘Why you don’t take in other people’s clothes and wash them?’” She told her story to a group of some 30, mainly young, people, who recently participated in a forum organised by the Rotary Club of Trafalgar New Heights, with support from JN Small Business Loans Limited and LASCO Distributors, to motivate members residing, or attending school in innercity communities and surrounding areas.
Victoria quickly acted on her impulse, and sold the idea to her partner, whom she described as being more sociable than she is, and influenced him to sell the idea to his friends.
Her idea was a success! She started her home-based business with her single washing machine, earning the money she needed to finance the hire-purchase agreement, and, was considering purchasing another machine at the point when she disclosed the information.