Rachel Sintamei is the proprietor of Sintamei Flower Shop situated a long Peponi Road in Westlands, Nairobi.
The entrepreneur who is a teacher by training dreamt of working in the city but securing a job was not easy forcing her to go back to her hometown.
Sintamei did other jobs in Nairobi and thought of different ideas before settling on selling flowers right in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Here is her story as told by WoK.
Background
Sintamei is a trained Christian Religious Education (CRE) and History teacher. She moved to Nairobi hoping that she would land a job.
However, she was unsuccessful forcing her to look for other ways of making money in the capital.
“Getting a job in Nairobi wasn’t easy so the only option I had was to go back home to Narok and I loathed the idea,” she said.
It is here that the successful businesswoman got a job as a customer care agent for a startup company where she worked for a year.
For a year, the entrepreneur tried different business ideas and when she finally zeroed in on the flowers business, COVID-19 struck.
“I was planning on starting a candle business because I could make them at home. Then I had another idea of becoming a sommelier because I am good with wines as well
“It’s at that point that the flower business idea hit me. I did some digging and realised would not be as capital-intensive as the other two,” she said.
Although Sintamei had no capital to set up a business on her own, she approached her florist who agreed to work with her on commission-based pay.
“I used to buy myself flowers, so I asked my florist if we could have an arrangement where I advertised bouquets online and they sent me the processed product to sell. They agreed,” she said.
She has a huge following on Twitter where she would take photos from the florist and advertise them on the social media platform.
“The COVID-19 pandemic really pushed my business growth because everybody was home and f lowers were the new thing in town, offering hope, I guess
“In the beginning, orders were few and far between. She sold two or three bouquets in a week, then the orders began to increase, rising to 50 per week,” she stated.
Opening her physical office
Sintamei worked with the florist for two years until she figured she had made enough money to have a physical shop.
It was then when she ended up at Peponi Road, Westlands.
The business, Sintamei Flowers, which started with zero capital currently rakes in about Ksh 800,000 per month.
“I laugh because my parents really wanted me back in Narok, since I had no business living in Nairobi. Now I do and I have also employed four young people to help me manage Sintamei Flowers,” she said.
Sintamei processes between 100-150 flowers per week.
“There is always business because flowers are perishable but also very addictive. In a week the business processes between 100-150 orders. The Valentines week was different; we did about 500 orders,” she said.
Her flowers trade from Ksh 1,000 to as much as Ksh 10,000.
“In most cases, bouquets are accompanied by gifts, for which I charge more. I know there are those who charge more than we do, but for me it’s the vision of the business that I have,” she explained.
Three years into the business, Sintamei is currently looking at venturing into events and horticulture in an expansion plan.
“I believe those who make a lot of money from this business are those who grow flowers. I would love to have a farm because then I can sell to more markets, including exports
“But the challenge at the moment is that it’s a capital – intensive undertaking and we are still very young,” she stated.
