Business The Lambs Furniture Company Nigeria Limited is into making of home furniture such as chairs, centre tables, stool, etc. I started about 20 years ago on a very small scale, but the business has grown and is now worth millions of naira.
Background I trained as a hairdresser. But my husband, my younger brother and even my children were into furniture making business. So, I left hairdressing and entered into a joint venture with my husband. But I have now established my own business. I left hairdressing because I saw furniture making as a higher net-worth business.
Challenges Electricity is the major concern. Ordinarily, we can make a set of sitting room furniture in less than a week, but when there is no electricity, it would be impossible to saw the wood and do some sewing for the finishing. Those are the issues that delay customers’ jobs. Though we use generator, generators cannot power some of the machines we use.
Many of the raw materials, especially quality ones such as certain types of wood, are now very expensive and are hard to come by. Apart from the leather, we get almost everything here but they are very costly. 20 years ago, leather used to be very cheap. A complete set of upholstered sitting room chairs used to cost about N2, 500, later it became N5, 000. This time the cheapest set now is N60, 000 due to the costs of the materials.
Things would be so much better in the furniture making industry if government can establish industrial parks with all the necessary facilities so that interested furniture makers can pay to use. It is sheer wastage to import furniture because we have highly skilled practitioners.
Most times, I get the designs of furniture we make when I travel to Italy by going to their factories. I then train my staff in Nigeria when I return. We produce furniture of the same quality. In fact, if we have all the facilities the Europeans have, we can do better than them.
Future plans The building the business currently operates from is rented. We want to have our own building for production and establish a standard showroom. Government has restrictions on display of furniture in the open air and we do not want issues. We also want to get all the necessary equipment such as those used in Europe.
Advice If a business is not moving forward or yielding profit, the operator should go to those who are more experienced, ask questions and learn from them.
Money management To wear the best gold and keep up with the Joneses, some women spend as much as N50, 000 to N100, 000 at a time. They could dip their hands into their business capital. She is thereby starving her business to beautify her body. That is eating the future today. If a business owner cannot exercise restraint, she could get an accountant. If she must do it herself, she should always keep in mind the need for self-denial for a while to safeguard the future. When I started out, I had to deny myself for the future. In the early days, I would always ask if my husband had lodged the money realised in the bank because I do not believe in wastage, which is ‘let us eat what we see today and hope for tomorrow.’ I believe every 10 kobo that comes into a business could be valuable for the future. I denied myself. I did not buy everything I needed so as to allow the business breathing space.
Staff I do not have issues with my workers because they come in as trainees and after acquiring the necessary skills they accept to become staff. So, I am able to relate well with them because I reared them.