As a form six chap on vacation, you can choose to sit back for close to six months & whine about being on vacation while you’re poverty-stricken or roll up some sleeves, do something that you will probably be proud of & could earn you a cool dime. For Marlena Kemigisha while a form 6 vacist two years ago, this was the time she deemed best for her to pursue her dream and passion.
At 18 years of age, Kemigisha set out to venture into making jewelry amidst her shyness, she fought and found confidence within herself to approach people to ask them to buy her products. With a starting capital of beads and a beading book from her brother and her mum’s friend, Marlena set out on a journey she wouldn’t believe it’d get her this far and giving birth to Marlena Jewellery.
‘Marlena Jewelry is handmade western jewelry that comprises of necklaces, bangles, and earrings; a business venture I started when I was in my form six vacation,’ narrates a humble Kemigisha Marlena, now 20, doing a Bachelors of Business Administration, year two, at Makerere University.
Because of her fear for rejection & her refusal to settle for failure as an option, driven by an overwhelming love for jewelry & designing, Marlena managed to start-up Marlena jewelry which today is the true source of her happiness.
“I am a creative, very ambitious and a reserved lady who hates failure, I keep a very low profile and I fear rejection!” Are the humble words a calm and humble Marlena puts to description when asked about herself.
Challenges
Like any inexperienced 18-year-old venturing into something you got prior knowledge about and competing with established brands, failure is something that is inevitable and a couple of setbacks will surely chip in. For Marlena, she had to overcome the hurdle of being shy and firmly gather the art of courage to approach potential customers and sell her products to them. Although she feared the negative attitude from her potential customers, she had to learn to overcome it.
The continued inadequate raw materials that make western jewelry and the overly difficult-do-deal with customers especially those who don’t know what they want is also a bug that Marlena will have to deal with as time goes on. ‘People are really hard to deal with especially if you they don’t know the kind of product they want’, she interrupts in a low tone.
Inflow
On a good day, Marlena makes close to 100k after sales of her pieces and she settles for 5k on a pretty bad day. From this money, Marlena has managed to get a fine upkeep for herself and with her entrepreneurial mindset, she relentlessly ploughs more of it back to her business.
Achievements
For a struggle that has lasted for two years, an achievement or two is something that can’t miss from a hustler’s story. Asked about some of the achievements she has attained from her struggle, she without hesitation in a jovial mood intimated to Campusbee that the amount of happiness when she sees a client wearing one of her creations really excites her. She sort of gets the “awwww” moment!
‘The status people accord to me as a designer and entrepreneur is amazing and I have been invited by Greenhill Academy for a motivational speech about my business which has made my mother and brother proud of me’, boasts the Makerere boss lady.
Future prospects
With this venture, Marlena believes that she has started something to build on after campus and she’s very grateful to the family support. In the near future, she intends on opening her shop with her label and venturing into fabric & interior designing and above all employ herself after campus.
Campus and business
Asked about how she juggles both books and business, she was quick to affirm the books comes first as a priority then business follows suit later.
Her source of inspiration and motivation is ‘When you cease to dream, you cease to live’ Malcom Forbes.
You can view her pieces and products on her Facebook page is Marlena Jewelry.
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