Winnie Wandimi is the CEO of Wimssy Limited, a dairy company manufacturing products such as fermented milk and yoghurt.
Having grown as a farm kid, the entrepreneur loved dairy and gained interest in the same as she grew up.
About 13 years ago Wandimi founded Wimssy Limited where she currently works with over 3,000 diary farmers.
Here is her story as told by WoK.
Interest
Wandimi’s parents were farmers and while growing up, she had interest in dairy farming as she loved cows.
Speaking in an interview with Utmost Precision, she noted that at some point, she was sure about investing in dairy in the future.
“I used to love dairy from a young age and as I grew up I knew I would do something in dairy. My parents were farmers so I always loved cows and milk,” Wandimi noted.
Later in future, the businesswoman quit employment and started Wimssy Limited, although they started small before scalling up.
“We started off with a milk bar, we had a very small room where we would do processing manually. We started thinking of how we can scale it up and buy more milk from farmers,” she noted.
Wandimi explained that after setting up up her milk bar, their products sold fast and as the demand grew, they were forced to add value to the milk.
“When we started the milk bar, products were moving very fast and we started doing more products that what we were doing at the time
“As Wimssy we decided that it was time to add the value to the milk because initially we were just dispensing fresh milk,” she stated.
More dairy products
It was at this point when Wandimi incorporated more farmers who would supply her with milk after which she’d package and sell.
She started her company with two employees and three farmers.
“Initially we started with two employees and we grew to five employees, and right now we are over 100 employees. The farmer base was about three farmers then and we kept growing, right now we are over 1,000 farmers,” she said.
Wandimi also noted that her company has been supporting farmers in ensuring that they produce the best quality of milk.
The support include offering trainings to farmers, giving the animal feeds and connections to government support services.
“We’ve really been supporting our farmers and that’s why we are able to work with more farmers because everyday we have been recruiting new farmers,” she stated.
Looking back, Wandimi noted that they would take a lot of time to process and sell a small quantity of milk but a lot has since changed.
“When we started, we started with 50 litres and we would even take three days to process and sell that milk but right now, we are able to handle whatever we receive from the farmers,” she said.
Challenges
The entrepreneur pointed out inadequate milk as the major challenge in the business.
This way, she explained, they have to compete with other companies in the dairy sector for the available milk.
“In the dairy sector, we have a lot of players and this means we are competing for limited milk. You have to make sure that you play your part in ensuring that you keep your farmers happy,” Wandimi stated.
For those who are seeking to venture into dairy farming, Wandimi advised;
“You need to be sure about what you want to do, the space that you want to go into and where to source for your milk. You also need to do a market research and understand the products that you want to do
“You also need to find out how the marker is responding to your products and also know the government policies and bodies that regulate manufacturing.”
