As the corona virus started, I actually panicked because it was barely 6 months after we restructured the Joadre fashion project to make it become independent of our Austrian company. We finished our intensive 3 year training that started in 2016. We supported many tailors to start their businesses because we still wanted to maintain the social impact we already created. Then a shutdown of the world hit our tailors hard. What would we do? I panicked!
It was time to work out new strategies. My “Why” remains unchanged. I want to support African SMEs to build their businesses, to become independent of charity, to build the life that they love. But how can I do it within the shutdown. Thank god for digital technology. Even though most of our work had been done digitally, this time, we had to step up the game. We began to design patterns and more produce training videos for our network.
Taiwo pioneers slow fashion in Nigeria. She empowers me.
An amazing lady that joined Joadre far back in 2014 is Taiwo Mayokun. Taiwo is an excellent tailor. But what amazes me about Taiwo is that she is very entrepreneurial. While she worked at Joadre production training facility in Nigeria, she began to save money from the salary she earned. Taiwo’s boyfriend was also a tailor. Both of them joined the capital they saved to start their own small production business after a couple of years with us. Since then, we have worked with Taiwo on several collections. Taiwo’s story empowers me. She empowers more apprentice learning at her production now. Is that not amazing? Watch out as we release a mini documentary on Taiwo’s work. Subscribe to my Youtube Channel and newsletter not to miss out.
We are launching Taiwo’s new Hair scrunchies
3 different scrunchy designs and over 8 different colorful fabrics. It was a fast and an unbelievable process partnering with Taiwo’s small business. So this is how it works. After we conclude a design, I develop the patterns. I sent out the sketch to our network of over 65 producers. Some took over 2 week to open up the file. Taiwo took a couple of minutes and in 2 days she had made a sample. That is someone with entrepreneurial spirit. Within weeks she had received the contract from me and could now begin to produce her collection. My partnership with Taiwo is to market this collection. The profits go back into investing in our entrepreneurial system.
Exciting right? Well join our mission!
Share our journey and listen to my new podcast where I will share more about this social impact business experience with you. Maybe you too can start your own social business project. You can choose to uplift your fashion wardrobe with one of Taiwo’s scrunchies because it is time to make sustainable and fair fashion the normality.
By the way, you can click this link to download the transparency card for this collection. Please it is important that you share it with your friends. I had to include some critical comments to the transparency card, because that is the reality of things for now. Thank you for reading and I appreciate every single subscription, follows, shares, likes and purchase.
Are you a german speaker, I did some translation. Read the german version on our german online blog.
Hey, thank you so much for stopping by and reading through to the end. I really appreciate it, because it takes so much to put this together. Hope you liked it. If you did, remember to share this blog on social media. Yes, more free training and videos on this topic will be out this month on YouTube. Not to miss out, subscribe and turn on the notification on Youtube. It would be nice if you follow me on instagram as I share daily strategies and personal fun stuff. I am on facebook as well but to get it all in one place, subscribe to my free newsletter. Drop your comments, questions, feedback beneath using the comment section and I will be happy to answer your questions in my next video or blog.
Look forward to hearing from you soon!
Cheers,
Joana
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