It takes grace to run a business and it takes the Grace of God to run a business successfully. We need to give business owners more accolades as often. I used to think it was an easy task, infact I enjoyed playing sales girl when I was younger. I thought it’s just the exchange of money for service and that’s it, but it’s way more than that. The technical aspect of keeping a business in check is not talked about enough. Running a successful business in Nigeria today requires a lot of patience & laying off staff without remorse. You also have to deal with dishonesty from the people you put in place and the most common, STEALING.
After getting so much complaints from my mom about how incompetent her staff were, I had to step in and assist for a while.
I know her business too well to not be able to run it smoothly. Also being one of her farm managers, it’s just way easier because it’s in the same line of business.
I’m currently playing manager for two stores, although both of the stores are beside each other it’s still a whole lot of work. It also requires a lot of calculation, stock taking and balancing as well as physical hardwork.
It’s a store that offers service to everything poultry and catfish. It caters for all their needs.
Poultry feeds are categorized into starters, super starters, growers, layers and finisher feeds.
POULTRY FEEDS
• Starters/super starters: These are high- protein feeds that help young chicks from as little as a week old to support their rapid growth during the early stages of their life.
• Growers: There are also rich filled protein feeds but a lesser percentage than the starter feeds. It helps with the middle phases of their lives.
• Finisher: These feeds are given to already mature chickens/broilers before selling out. It helps with the meat quality and most importantly, their weight.
Same way these feeds differ, their prices are not left out. The starter feeds are slightly more expensive than the grower and finisher feeds. A bag ranging from N19,000 being the least according to the different brands of feeds. Some brands are higher in quality than the others. Each bag of feeds weigh 25kg.
Adjusting to the economic situation and how expensive these bags of feeds are, there are also shared into kg’s and halves so it’s affordable for every farmer.
Poultry drugs like antibiotics, vaccines, anti parasites and anti- stress are sold as well. These drugs help vaccinate and prevent infections.
Feeders and drinkers are also available at the store.
CATFISH FEEDS
There are different brands of these feeds. Way more pricey than the poultry feeds. Catfish feeds are categorized by MM’s in diameter depending on the fish’s age and size. 1.5mm being the smallest and 9mm being the biggest.
1.5mm feeds are given to fry and fingerlings, usually a few weeks old.
The 9mm feeds are given to catfish that has reached full maturity for sale, usually above 5 months old.
I spend most of the time cross checking, keeping records of the stock, engaging customers and keeping track record of the transactions. I’ll be spending more time managing her store and help curb silly activities.
The fun part about my mini job is we get to take brand pictures for advertisement and i indulge them in TikTok content for promotion.
It hasn’t been easy so far but I think I’m growing to learn and love this style of business.
Thanks for reading 💗
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