Business Link Pacific champions innovation and entrepreneurship. We especially admire businesses in the Pacific Islands that are simultaneously creating social impact through their operations or producing thought-provoking products that aim to solve global issues.
With the current global environment, the importance of business innovation is overly apparent. The ability to think outside of the box when it comes to problem-solving while maintaining a work-life balance is a must-have skill, even more so for businesswomen who are often juggling work and home responsibilities.
We recently had the pleasure of interviewing two female entrepreneurs in Fiji, who both operate successful businesses, and who have generated that success in the face of adversity.
In this article, we talk to Sagufta Janif, founder and owner of The Fusion Hub and Dipti Sharma, founder and owner of Eventuros Fiji about their entrepreneurial journey and their new working relationship courtesy of the BLP and yher Pacific partnership.
The Fusion Hub was born out of Sagufta Janif’s desire to provide a solution to Fiji’s growing waste problem, create a sustainable Fiji and contribute to the economic empowerment of Fijian women. She was recently awarded the 2020 Commonwealth Youth Award for the Pacific region for her social enterprise, and was the winner of Women in Business’ (Fiji) award for Aspiring Entrepreneur of the Year in 2019.
The Fusion Hub specialises in reusing and upcycling waste products (tyres, pallets, plastic and glass bottles, textiles etc…) into quality furniture and high-end home decor pieces, some of which decorate Fiji resorts and hotels. Sagufta spent the majority of the start-up phase researching the different ways to prolong the life of a product through upcycling. The materials are sourced from landfills, garage sales, inorganic collections, donations from companies and individuals as well as participation in beach clean-ups, and undergo a stringent cleaning process before they are transformed into home decor items.
The Fusion Hub primarily employs single mothers to carry out the design and manufacturing work. Raised by a single mother herself, Sagufta knows firsthand the economic struggles single mothers in Fiji face, “In the Pacific Islands if you are a woman and if you are all alone, if you don’t have the right education background, you are disadvantaged economically. I wanted to bring these women up.”
Sagufta’s belief is that by including women in the solution to the global waste crisis, this will lead to the gradual change of attitudes towards consumption and the way waste is managed. As she explains, in remote villages in Fiji it is usually women and children who are responsible for disposing of waste, purchasing consumables or domestic items for the home, rather than men.
The Fusion Hub runs a 2 week “Waste-2-Worth” capacity building program for women in which they learn basic joinery skills, common upcycling tips and tricks, basic upholstery, power tool usage, colour schemes and design techniques. After successfully completing the training program, they are either offered full-time employment with The Fusion Hub or the opportunity to start their own upcycling business and become part of The Fusion Hub supply chain.
Sagufta currently employs seven women, three of which work onsite and the rest work from home so they can take care of their kids. The Fusion Hub works hard to give the women a sense of responsibility and ownership over the design and manufacturing process, employing women who are truly passionate about creating social impact.
When thinking about the role gender has played in her entrepreneurial journey, Sagufta said at that first she wasn’t fully aware that it would play such a large role in the success of her enterprise, “I don’t think I ever thought of gender as a challenge but definitely when I was trying to find finance, look for grants, when they saw that it’s a woman coming in doing the pitch for a furniture-making business, dealing with waste in the Pacific it’s like a no-no, you know, women cannot do that, it’s not what they are ‘supposed’ to be doing, so trying to break that stereotype is very difficult.”
In mid 2019, Sagufta was part of a group of female entrepreneurs who participated in the first yher Pacific Islands Accelerator program (based on the successful ygap Accelerator program). The yher Pacific Islands program supports women-led impact ventures that are improving the lives of people living in poverty across the Pacific region, by providing access to the skills, knowledge, connections, funding and community they need to build sustainable and scalable ventures.
Not long after the yher Pacific Islands Accelerator program took place in Fiji, Business Link Pacific proudly announced a new partnership with yher Pacific. This young partnership is key to BLP’s Gender Equity and Social Inclusion strategy, in place to ensure that where possible the BLP programme is actively supporting the growth of socially inclusive and women-led enterprises.
As part of this partnership, BLP has been providing an avenue for the women who completed the 2019 yher Pacific program, to access quality business advice. In Sagufta’s case, one of the main takeaways from the yher Pacific sessions was her need for a stronger digital presence, including the creation of a website and a strategic marketing plan aimed at increasing revenue generation.
Through the BLP-yher Pacific partnership, Sagufta was connected with Dipti Sharma, owner and founder of Eventuros Fiji, an experienced digital marketing agency and BLP approved business advisor.
Dipti Sharma began Eventuros Fiji in 2017 originally in Nadi, but the business is now based in Lautoka. Eventuros specialises in digital marketing, web development, event management, web hosting and design, e-commerce, copywriting, SEO and social media marketing. Dipti has been a finalist twice in the Women in Business Aspiring Entrepreneur of Year category, and in August 2019 she was awarded with an Asia Women Leaders citation by Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Asia.
Dipti explains that there are very few digital marketing firms in Fiji, with most of them being web developers. Eventuros is different in that respect as they specialise in SEO and Google Adwords, the tools needed for growing businesses to extend their reach to new audiences and markets. She also notes that there are very few women in the digital marketing sector in Fiji.
“When I started Eventuros, our focus was mostly on event management. We are so glad that at this point in time, that we have Business Link Pacific, all these people coming in to provide guidance. When I actually started my business, I was pretty much lost. I didn’t know what to do, where to start from,” says Dipti.
Eventuros Fiji has worked on projects for both domestic and international clients, with a special focus on small and growing businesses who sometimes aren’t fully aware of the benefits of embracing digital marketing tools.
“Dipti’s key advice for fellow female entrepreneurs is “It’s all about time management. I have to balance multiple roles, operating Eventuros, being a Special Administrator for the Fiji Council, being a mum, a wife, a daughter, a sister and friend. And have time for myself too.”
“I also want to tell all the girls out there that, don’t ever think that if somebody tells you you can’t do it, if somebody tells you that ‘oh, you don’t have the potential, you can’t do anything’ don’t ever think that ‘oh yeah if you have said it, maybe I can’t do it’. No. You have the whole potential in you, you should do it. Sometimes when you can’t find a chair, you’ve got to make a chair for yourself to sit down.”
“When I started working with Eventuros, Dipti and her team understood the urgency of supporting these women and supporting the communities that we are working with. She offered the payment plan option (BLP Subsidy) and she said ‘I’m gonna work with you and we’re gonna design this together.’ At every stage she involves me and I don’t feel left out of the process,” explains Sagufta.Both Sagufta and Dipti are excited about the new possibilities for business growth in Fiji with the use of BLP services:
“I think the Subsidy is great because having access to those business advisors is quite expensive for an SME. I personally think that BLP has created a space for all the aspiring entrepreneurs and all the SMEs so that we can grow. As an entrepreneur, you wear all the hats. You’re your marketing person, you’re your finance person, you’re your HR person, you’re everything, and sometimes we get bogged down and it demotivates us. Having business advisors come in and take that pressure away from you really helps you focus on the other aspects of your business,” says Sagufta.If you are a growing business based in the Pacific, with between 5-50 employees and you’d like to gain subsidised access to quality business advice through Business Link Pacific, contact your in-country representative: PNG: Apeo Timoci png@businesslinkpacific.com Vanuatu: Yvonne Leo Taiki vanuatu@businesslinkpacific.com Samoa: John Lemoa samoa@businesslinkpacific.com Fiji: Ramesh Chand fiji@businesslinkpacific.com Cooks Islands & Solomon Islands: Paul Wendland info@businesslinkpacific.com yher Pacific Islands is now recruiting Pacific based female entrepreneurs with social impact ventures for their 2020 yher Pacific Accelerator program. Click here to learn how to apply: https://yherpacificislands.org/program/