From media star to entrepreneur
Kasavan went on to obtain certification in social entrepreneurship from the Gordon Institute of Business Science and spent three years researching how to make a pad that would help girls to feel comfortable and confident as young women.
She raised funds from family and friends and after testing samples, she spent R350 000 on importing a container of pads early last year.
“I had these pads and I just needed to sell them to the right corporate social investment people. I was in extreme poverty and CSI only operates on a certain level and when you are a new business with little credibility, people don’t really want to help you,” she said.
But she eventually won support from many JSE listed companies including Deloitte, Unilever, Standard Bank and Absa.
“By July, I had already moved close to 20 000 pads and by Women’s Month last year I was moving stock across the country based on CSI,” she said
“I had no job and no backing at the time. Then my funding came through with the IDC (Industrial Development Corporation) and a year later my world changed.
“I branded with one of the best agencies in the country and put together a public relations strategy and partnered with the biggest brewery in the world, SABMiller,” she said.
Kasavan now outsources the manufacturing of Happy Days pads to a nappy factory in Soweto and turns over more than R1 million a year.
She is doing further market research and has a vision to open a factory in Inanda in October next year which she estimates will create 100 jobs for unskilled women.
Together with SAB Miller’s CSI department, Kasavan is already in a pilot project, training unskilled women between 18 and 35 as brand ambassador agents, who directly sell the pads to girls and women in their communities.
Kasavan noted that rural women had to spend R30 for a round trip to get to town and at least a further R20 to buy sanitary pads.
“We are not badly priced in the market. We sell at R12 for a pack of 10 and the agent makes R2. The idea was that our business is about accessibility and affordability, so we bring your pads to you. A person in your community sells the pads and makes a profit,” she said.
“It’s a three-layer business: socially, it takes care of its goals from a CSI perspective; from an enterprise development arm, we empower women in communities; and on a retail level the aim is that for every pack of pads you buy, we donate one and a portion goes to a trust and keeps our business running continuously,” she said.
Kasavan also envisions producing a range of adult nappies and wet wipes and, with the huge interest she is now getting, she is confident of attracting further investment.
“I think we (Happy Days) will become local partners with a global brand. I see a Happy Days Africa. I believe someone is going buy us out next year because of the noise our brand makes,” Kasavan said.