Blog
Empowering SMEs and Uplifting Kenyan Workers: Our Journey with the USADF - Stanbic Bank Kenya Foundation Grant
Join us as we celebrate VAAKENYA’s award of the USADF - Stanbic Bank Kenya Foundation Grant, aimed at empowering SMEs and uplifting Kenyan workers. This initiative will enhance our production of high-quality leather safety shoes, supporting job creation and industry growth while prioritizing worker comfort and protection. Discover how we’re committed to strengthening Kenya’s leather value chain and building a sustainable future.
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Why You Should Own Penny
They are the perfect travel shoe- Easy to slip on and off during security checks at the airport and they go easy with anything you have packed. You also have everything you need footwear-wise- from walking around the city to dinners and business meetings.
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Reflection This Easter Holiday From Our CEO NJERI MBOTE
Reflections on success- As an entrepreneur, it's important to celebrate successes and learn from failures. I love knowing why I won on so I can replicate that success. In business, there are few wins in a given year that you can scale, which is why it's important to multiply success as quickly as possible. For example, I now have a business model that is scalable and successful--I'm looking for investors, friends, and partners so we can scale even faster. Just to be clear, "scaling quickly" means it will take months/years. Entrepreneurs time is like dog years but way slower than human years.
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When Bias Is Systemic- Men, Women and Shoes
One time, a lady ordered a pair of SHIRO flats and called back after a day in them to order 10 more pairs. She realized she had gone through the day without thinking about her feet for the first time in her adult life. She only realized she still had her shoes on in the house when her teen daughter shouted at her to take off her shoes. Comfort should not be privilege's.
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The Women In Jua Kali Context
The main goal of this project is to empower women through financial access, impacting skills and financial education to women in the informal sector and transition 100 women owned businesses from the informal to the formal sector. We will train 40 young females in the art of shoemaking and bag making. At the end of the training, they will be attached to various manufacturing companies and micro enterprises to hone their skills and enhance their employability in the formal sector. We will establish a common manufacturing unit equipped with adequate resources for research, development, design and manufacturing that will be accessible to all women manufacturers, not limited to our partners.
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VAAKENYA BACKGROUND
VaaKenya is the first-ever online platform on a mission to revolutionize how we buy made in Kenya. We started off in 2017, selling made in Kenya shoes. A few months into it, we were getting unending requests for customization and were not able to meet them due to a lack of skill and capacity from our artisans. This opened up to the issues we had in our industry. One was that lack of standard African sizes led to a lot of African outlier sizes missing out on fitting footwear. Second, the biggest challenge our manufacturers were facing was a lack of both financial and talent capacity. To be able to solve these problems, we needed to understand how the industry works from the inside, from a point of empathy. This is what led us to open our first workshop where we started manufacturing shoes customized for African feet. We used this period to make patterns, create standards for footwear manufacturing and learn ways of customizing footwear in respect to different shapes and sizes. Our biggest challenge remained to be artisans. We had limited artisans and retaining them was very hard. Most were entrenched in the informal sector with minimal skills. It was always quantity over quality. To scale, we needed to be able to retain artisans and also increase our production capacity by buying more machines and equipment. We thus set out to look for an investor and as a result, met our first angel investor. He invested KSH 1.3 million and with that, we were able to scale, afford good talent and retain it, retrain constantly, and most importantly, the space to do more research and development into our products.
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Another Valentine Single- Millennial Love
Don’t get me wrong. I have never been in love. I am sure I have been loved. I have spent most of my twenties running away from women who might have loved me while chasing those that didn’t care about me even in the slightest. One of life’s cruelest ironies. So, who am I to speak of love, eh? They say, though, those yet to experience certain things typically are in a better position to define them. I tend to agree, seeing as love makes fools of us all. So, out of curiosity, what is love? Somebody once said (people claim it was Eminem but that doesn't sound like him) love is just a word, we give it meaning. It's not the storm and the thunder, it’s not the raging fire. Sometimes love is just as simple as your father buying you a pair of shoes under the guise of “Nilinunua hizi viatu lakini hazikunitosha. Hebu pima uone.” It’s the feeling you get when you see the ones you care about get excited by a gift you got them, not because strangers on Twitter told you socks and boxers are the perfect gift to give your love on Valentine’s but because you saw their eyes light up when they saw the Vaakenya catalogue and nothing makes you happier than seeing them smile again.
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CHRISTMAS THOUGHTS FROM OUR TEAM LEADER-NJERI MBOTE LETTERS
And to our clients, you are the one that has brought us all together. Without you, we would not exist. Thank you for allowing us the opportunity to fulfill the company’s core value, dignifying African feet. We keep you in our hearts as we celebrate Christmas this year and we hope that you and your family have all the happiness in the world. Purchasing from Vaakenya means you believe in a self-sufficient Africa as well as in our ability to make quality products. Every purchase allows us to keep going so that our children can build even bigger brands allowing them to surpass us ensuring not only a sustainable future but a better tomorrow as well. And for that, you have our deepest thanks.
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VaaKenya's A Journey of Courage, Bravery and Kenyan
In 2017, two young women did a ballsy thing: they started a shoe business, and not just selling shoes, but also making them. Njeri Mbote, then a fresh graduate, was introduced to the shoe business by a friend and was fascinated. Like Julius Yego who learned how to throw a javelin through YouTube, Njeri made good use of tutorials on the internet and learned the art of shoe designing. She says it was very important for her company VaaKenya, which is based in Greenfield, Doonholm, to have started in this manner, from scratch, not unlike the Silicon Valley garage startups which now rule the world. The advantage, she says, of starting from scratch is you get to build your own systems, your own company culture, and you get to learn on the job. As Njeri was learning how to design shoes, her friend and partner Daisy Riri was learning how to market VaaKenya and transform it into a brand. The pair of unlikely business partners would forge a strong synergy that would propel the startup forward, through the valley of death that is the first year of a business; and two years later, in 2019, VaaKenya received its first funding. Njeri Mbote, an articulate young woman, states she would not have it any other way. In entrepreneurship, she says, the mistake many people make is thinking you have to start with a lot of capital. What’s important is for an entrepreneur to have clarity on what their business needs at each step of the way. She says had they gotten the funding at the beginning, they would have squandered it. But in the course of those initial two years of building their company, Njeri and Daisy learned a great deal and grew their capacity, so when they got the funding in 2019, they were ready, understood what the business needed, and knew what to do with the money.
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FUNCTION OF THE FEET
If the middle portion or arch of your footprint is just about halfway filled in with a noticeable curve along the arch, congratulations! Your arches are at the proper height to absorb and distribute the impact from walking and other physical activity.
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Deep Dive On Sandals Evolution Over The Years
Ancient Egyptians wore sandals made of palm tree leaves and papyrus, as sometimes observed on the feet of Egyptian statues. Ancient Greeks wore sandals far more often, with sandals being the most common type of footwear worn by women. The Greek sandals featured a multitude of straps with which they securely fastened to the foot. The top of the sandals was usually of colored leather. The soles were made of cattle skin, of even better quality, and made up of several layers. Citizens of Ancient Rome used to carve their boots and sandals with elaborate designs while biblical sandals were made from non-processed leather and dry grass with strings or ropes made of simple, cheap materials. Though, sometimes golden or silver beads and even gems were added. North African and Middle Eastern nomads developed various inventive sole shapes to allow for better movement in desert terrains. The sub-Saharan Hausa used sandals with large soles that extend well beyond the foot, while curved soles were utilized in Uganda, and rolled toes were developed in Arabia. Ancient Aztecs and Mayans of Central America adopted a thick-soled sandal with a protective legging attached at the heel, while the top of the foot and shin remained exposed.
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Contact Info
- Address: Doonholm, Greenfield shopping center, first floor, Nairobi
- Phone: +254 739 042644
- Email: info@vaakenya.com
