By Prudence Minayo
Muthoni Ngugi is the founder of Gaze Furnishings, currently Gaze Global Limited. A successful entrepreneur, Muthoni has been through the most both in her personal and business life. Through the ups and downs, the businesswoman, who was listed under Forbes 30 under 30, is proof that there is always morning after the darkness.
Here is her inspiring story as told by WoK.
Background
She was born in Nairobi, Kenya in 1995 and thereafter moved to Belgium with her mother at the age of five. They moved back to Kenya a year before she could complete primary school. Thereafter, she joined Statehouse Girls and was an outgoing student.
Employment
Straight out of high school, she got a teaching job for Ksh4,000 a month and a tutor job in the evening for Ksh3,000. She moved out of her mum’s house at 19 and got waitressing jobs at two different restaurants.
At this time, she would visit markets and look at household items. Later, she got a PA job before graduating to a PR company that did marketing for Kenyatta University. The job was amazing and so was the pay.
She started with Ksh50,000 then progressed to Ksh70,000. The then young professional lived modestly despite her earnings and saved a big chunk of the money.
Her goal was to buy a car. However, when she went to purchase it the person advised her to start a business first before she could buy a car. By this time, she had quit the job.
Muthoni joined the University of Nairobi and pursued a Bachelor of Commerce, Finance Option. Later on, she would do a course in Human Resource Management and acquire a Private Pilots License.
Furniture Business
When she first moved into her house, she had no furniture. However, she wished to furnish her house with some of the best there was. Hence, she would conceive what she wanted and sell the idea to the carpenters, some who had never seen such designs.
Finally, she ventured into the furniture business. She would have the carpenter make something and post it on Instagram. The name Gaze was inspired by the desire to create something that people would enjoy looking at.
Slowly by slowly, she gained a number of clients. They began making and also importing furniture for clients. Business became good and at 23, she bought off-plan housing from Wilstone Homes in Kamulu.
Relationship
While business was booming and clients were flocking their office in droves, she met a man whom she then thought would be the love of her life. In less than a year, they moved in together with her bringing the furniture and the partner taking care of the rent.
They would split bills and life was rosy for a while and she ignored the red flags. When things got bad and she was breaking it off, she found out she was expecting. Hence, they got back together.
Slowly the verbal arguments turned physical while she was still pregnant and they were on vacation. When she was six months pregnant, he beat her senseless.
Her water broke and she was rushed to the hospital where she gave birth prematurely. She stayed in the hospital with the baby and her partner began cheating in their home.
When she and the baby got home, the fights continued. One day, he attacked her and one of his friends intervened.
With her phone in hand, she ran away barefoot and hurt and left the baby behind. At the time, the baby was still tiny and needed the mother. However, he refused to allow her have the baby until the police intervened and talked to him.
Troubled Business
During this time, her personal and business accounts were losing money. Then, workers from one branch stole from her.
A store that was turning in Ksh5 million only had Ksh300,000 in the account. To add to this, she had been living lavishly with her partner thinking there was an endless supply of money.
Detailing her journey on a YouTube channel called The Failure Effect, she explained that to make it worse, she moved into a bigger house.
She was trying to prove that she could still live well even after the separation. Then, she took a loan, giving her cars as collateral since she was struggling to maintain the business.
Things became hard and even keeping up with clients’ orders was difficult. A mentor advised her to cut down her expenses and go back to living modestly as she once did.
However, she went on until in 2022 a fire burned their warehouse. She took the cars to her creditors as she couldn’t pay the loan and the fire left her with a total debt of Ksh10 million.
Then, came a severe mental crisis. She sought help but felt it was too much and at one point attempted suicide. When she woke up sweating but alive, she decided to fight.
A New Chapter
She talked to the clients and agreed on a payment plan and for some promised to deliver their initial order albeit late. Things picked up slowly and even the clients she started the business with in 2017 came back looking to upgrade their furniture.
Eventually, she moved back into her mother’s house and believes failure is not a bad thing and if one hasn’t failed then they haven’t started.
Today, she doesn’t count success in terms of money but in terms of the experiences and lessons learnt along the way.
“But now it doesn’t matter. I can say I am successful not because of the money I have seen or I have made or the possessions we have had and lost. It is because of the co-values that I’ve acquired through all these process and its because I can empower somebody who is almost at that stage or who is afraid to get there…….That is my success story,” she said in the interview with The Failure Effect.
Apart from furniture, the resilient entrepreneur also wishes to start Gaze Magazine and get into the aviation industry. She has 40 hours of flying and hopes to own her own planes one day including cessna aircrafts which she could lease out.
