Antony Kalume Mulewa.

Having being raised by a single mother, Anthony Kalume of 25 years, always dreamt of being his own boss and be self employed. His biggest inspiration was his mother who raised all her 7 children single handedly without depending on anyone. She too, is a business woman who keeps trying out different business ideas.

Anthony had grown up in both Mombasa and Nairobi town. He studied to college level where he studied IT. After completion of his course he tried searching for a job with no success. He therefore decided to start his own business in 2012 of selling male clothes alongside movies. The start was quite difficult but even then, he very well knew that every new business has a slow start. He panicked when the first clients came to his shop; not sure what prices he should give them. Anthony also made several mistakes at the beginning like giving big discounts to friends and giving the starting price very low. Anthony’s mother motivated him with the words ‘everything is about trying’ while his KYBT mentor, Abbas kept telling him not to lose hope during the low season.

However, with experience he learnt the business market and with time he was going on very well with the business. The building in which he was working in was bought and he and his partner in the business had to leave.

He moved to another stall which was much smaller and he could only do the movie business without the clothes. He was getting less profit than before and his friend told him about KYBT. It is then that Anthony came to the offices and requested for a loan to start his clothes business once again. He was granted Kshs 30,000 and he is currently in another area where he is going on very well with both the movie and clothes business.

His suggestion is that bigger loans should be offered for starters so that they can establish their businesses properly. Anthony really appreciates the support he got from KYBT and his advice to the youth is that they should try out something and not just complain that there are no opportunities.

His hope for the future is to be a supplier of clothes and try other businesses like the matatu sector.