My name of Batison Bisalome, I stay in Mfuti Village, T/A Kalonga Salima. After undergoing 6 months trainings in Carpentry & Joinery at Habitat Resource Centre in 2018, I decided to start my own carpentry and joinery business. I have established this business in May 2019.
My desire to be independent and responsible citizen has been my greatest drive for starting up my own business. Before I was trained at Habitat Resource Centre, I was relying on piecework to support my mother and siblings. Thanks to Habitat For Humanity and donors for equipping me with skills in Carpentry & Joinery and entrepreneurship during the training and internship.
I started from scratch a week after completing internship at Emmanuel Workshop. With the few tools I bought with the money I saved during the internship, I started this business. This is a first month in business but I have sold out a bed, coffee table and door. And I have also received part payment from customer for bed.
I have to admit starting up a business is not easy, I have faced many challenges. As you know carpentry and joinery business requires one to have many tools to fully meet customer demands, so far I have few tools, I don’t have enough capital and I rely on renting tools from other carpenters.
I have already started and I want to elect workshop shed, buy more tools and materials. I will appreciate for any support to meet my startup costs. My future plan is to have my business registered and grow this workshop into a bigger workshop with electric machines and employ more peoples.
My advice to my fellow is that the time is here now, there is no better day to start your business than today. Whatever skills you have, start your journey of being your own boss with that.
