 You're watching a Y254 TV business Tuesday interview right now. We are talking about the impact of COVID-19 to businesses and manufacturing industry. I'm speaking to Prishna Arsha, CEO of One Stop Enterprise. Send us your comments or questions to all of our social media platforms at Y254 channel. Good evening. Hi, Hilary. How are you? Awesome. Great. It's an honor to have you here. Thank you for having me. Now, COVID-19 has affected almost every person in the society, be it an employee in the office or someone who has been doing the small businesses. They have been affected in one way or the other. And I am sure even you as a manufacturer, there's a way you have been affected. And I'd like to know, with the continuous measures that have been put in place, how have you been coping with the situation in your manufacturing company? Thanks, Hilary. So first of all, the biggest problem we faced was trying to encourage social distancing in the factory. When you're working in a factory situation, we're doing food processing. Social distancing was never an issue. And suddenly, come March, we're being told that you've got to have two meters separating you. So we've had to incorporate social distancing in the factory. The other thing is having masks on all the time. It's very, very uncomfortable having a mask on. So that's another thing that we've had to encourage. We always had good hygiene where our staff were very well trained in washing hands as often as they needed to. So that was not something new or something we struggled with. We are at a situation where most people have been laid off. And especially as we were talking about the social distancing, we saw some of the fast containment measures was working with shifts or in shifts. And did this affect your labour in terms of reducing the number of people working at a particular time? Or how did you apply the measure? So we've always run a very lean machine. We've never been overly overstaffed. However, what we did do was we started sending people on leave, which is normal paid leave. In the past, we've been sending everyone at one time on leave. This time, because of COVID, we decided that we would send two or three people every for two weeks leave. And that's how we've reduced the number of staff at any given time in the factory. And having reduced the number of people working at a particular period of time, did the supply or the production of certain measures, say you get to have a lot, did you reduce the number of production? Yeah, a production capacity reduced marginally. Obviously, it would. And also what you see is a lot of staff are doing something else in addition to what their normal duties are, just because they're covering up for someone else. Where you're working with two drivers instead of more. And so your workload has increased as well. Are they understanding the situation if they have to work for more hours or maybe have to work harder for two people? They are understanding. They're not working more hours because we're also very aware of the curfew. The curfew was much earlier, so we would close the factory at 4.30. Now we're closing at 5.00 or 5.30 so that people get home on time. But yes, our staff, we've been lucky. They are very, very understanding that they know that they have to make up for someone else's absence. And since you're in the food industry, how is the market doing for you? We were not too badly affected. You know, when there was a lot of panic buying, we really enjoyed ourselves. Sales were brilliant. The month of June has seen a reduction in sales, but we're also hoping that come July, things pick up again. And we're praying that the economy actually is slowly opened up. Other than the containment measures that the government has put in place to ensure the spread of COVID-19 has stopped what we are saying is containing every person, containing every situation that we can. What else have you done in your company to ensure that we have fought COVID-19 and we've won? So our staff are all tested. And they're continuously tested. Not only for COVID, but all other sorts of diseases that can be passed on because of food processing. This is something we've done for years. We've just had to add COVID onto that. However much it's been expensive for us. The other thing that we've done is that we've consciously, as employers, decided that we're not giving our staff pay cuts. Awesome. So that is a conscious decision. As employers, we've made the first question when everything was going on. Our staff and our shop steward came and asked us, so, you know, what's going to happen? Because they were scared. They were hearing from their friends. And we said, well, until we can manage, we're not going to give you a pay cut. The day we can't is when we're going to talk about it. So far, touch wood, we've been lucky and we've never given a pay cut. You must say that was kind of you because I know most of the people who are sent home and paid leave. Others have been given the pay cuts of which they didn't take it kindly. Considering how the economy has been even before COVID-19. Now, tell me about this business now. I understand you've been in operation for years. How has your success story been? So I'll start with the history of the business. It was begun in 1982 by my father and his brothers. They, our family suffered a financial hardship and we filed for bankruptcy. There was a point where there was no money for even milk for myself and my cousins. And the fallback as usual is you go back to what you know. And my grandfather said, well, my mom was very good at cooking and she still is. And why not? And that's the birth of one stop. All right. We started, they started at home on these huge big jicos that would take like the biggest bag of charcoal and they would fry crisps and chevda and things on that. They grew and we moved into a premises in Gara which we occupied until 2018. Just the other day. Just the other day where we needed more space as we're growing and we decided to move to Babadogo into a nice new factory premises. Yeah. I must say it has been quite a journey. It's only that you didn't go to details we can already tell how it has been. But of course we are speaking to the youth who would want to come up with something. Who would want to go back to what they know like you have mentioned. Now how do I, do I materialize the idea that I have and make it work? You've got to try. You have to keep on trying and it's hard work. I remember up to probably the 90s my dad was literally still frying crisps alongside the staff. So nothing comes easy. You mentioned in crisps and I know some of the the youth or any person I've seen on traffic cleaning, robes selling crisps and like I want to find a nini. Yeah. You know they feel like this is not the kind of a job. What would you say about most of us who say I can only do this and that but the other thing I can't? My mom has always told me there's no job that's a small job. You will find me even in the factory helping where there's help that is required. My mom and dad still come to work for half the day and they will do. My mom will sometimes sit down and help them pack a packet of crisps if that's what's required and especially the last few months where we've been short staffed. She's been doing whatever needs to be done. So no job is too small to be done and you don't know where which job will actually make you become the millionaire that you want to be. We are at a state where we have a number of youths who are unemployed and it has been a notch cry to the government and to every other stakeholder we do not have our youth employed. And the question that will be there is or the response that comes from many is find something to do and then again this argument from some of them do you all become entrepreneurs? Why not? Then who consumes for who? There's always room for consumption because what you're going to do I may not do. So you're creating a market for what you need to do. All right now brings me to the question about competition. How do you fit in the competition? Is there a fair competition in what you produce and others? And then how are you able to sustain yourself throughout the business enterprise? So within the industry there is fair competition. However we have people Indian women making these things at home and that's totally unfair because we have to be compliant with NEMA, CARBS, city county licenses, etc. When you're making something from home you're not fully compliant. So your overheads are much lower. When you're running a whole enterprise your overheads are high because you're fully compliant you've got safety measures in place. So that's where the unfair competition comes in. And someone would argue I don't have enough money to have say somewhere to work from unless I work from home I know of people who cook from home and they start playing out here. They don't have to fight with the Kanju in the streets. They cook from home. They don't have enough money. What don't you think? I agree. You don't have enough money right now but you've got to start somewhere. That's where you start but don't stay there forever. I have to move. You have to move. You have to grow. Once you grow you need to become fully compliant. All right. Why do you think most of the youth are reluctant to take up opportunities that come even if they are as humble as they could be? Could it be finances? I don't know if finances sometimes does play a role. We even as industries face times when finances are tight for us. Right now we're facing financials. We know we have to play around. It could be finances. It could be lack of mentors. Yeah. Could be lack of resources. You have mentioned of a mentor. Are you bringing someone in this line or maybe in the other line to help them become what they have wished to become? So we've done it within our own factory where we've seen two of our very valued employees grow into positions of supervisors and into positions where they are now able to autonomously make decisions and where I can trust them and say, okay, you can make that decision and I've seen them make decisions and they've been the right decisions. I am also being mentored at the moment so I am not over the learning process. No one has approached me for mentorship but I would love to be able to, you know, impart my knowledge to someone when the time is right. Maybe as you wind up I would like to know how do we most of the people have a problem of financial management especially when they have a business. You will find them they say, I had this profit but I can't account for it. Not that they misuse but there's a way they can't account for every care. How do you keep your records? How do you manage your finances as far as your business is concerned? When you're small you can't afford an accountant but someone recently told me, get a friend. I'm sure within your friends you've got someone who's an accountant. Let that person help you even if it's on a Saturday. Secondly, make sure you know where every penny is coming from and where every penny is going. Even if you're putting it down in an exercise book and account for it. That will help someone go far too much. If you need to make sure you know what's coming in and what's going out. The minute you're not on top of that then you don't know where your money is going. Exactly. And don't use your business money for yourself. I thought the profit is mine. The profit is not yet yours. The profit is to be put back in the business until there's so much profit in the business that it can become yours. And is there time that it will be enough? Yes. There is always enough. All right because I know billionaires always look for another billion. Yes. You'll never stop looking. You'll never stop looking. But once you have your billion you know you can spend 50 million. Awesome. Now I'd like you to speak to someone out there and tell them especially the young people regarding now that we are speaking of COVID-19 is it about time they come up with a new idea? How are they supposed to cope with the situation with SMEs? And maybe an encouragement to someone who feels like they have lost it all during this pandemic. Thank you. I think you just need to keep your head up. The pandemic is going to end but it's still here with us for a while. There's a lot of information out there. There's so many webinars, so many Zoom meetings that you can go to. So many courses that have been subsidized or free that whilst you're at home whilst you're doing this you can actually be in you know expanding your knowledge and nothing is lost. Thank you. All right thank you so much for coming and sharing your story and encouraging our young people to taking up our chances out there and making the best out of it especially the financial management. I have to take care of myself. Thank you so much. Thank you for keeping us company. It has been business Tuesday. We were speaking about the impact of COVID-19 to the businesses and enterprise. My guest was Prishna Shah, CEO of OneStop Enterprise. Thank you so much for coming. Have yourself a very good night. My name is Adereva Hillary. Goodbye.