Why I abandoned university degree for shoe making — Psychology graduate

Shoe making is one of the profitable business trends in Nigeria because shoes are one of the most necessary expendables after food and clothing. The shoe making industry is an area women hardly engage in, but Mrs Lovette Lowo, who resides in Lagos, is one of the few women competing with men in the market. […]

Shoe making is one of the profitable business trends in Nigeria because shoes are one of the most necessary expendables after food and clothing. The shoe making industry is an area women hardly engage in, but Mrs Lovette Lowo, who resides in Lagos, is one of the few women competing with men in the market.

Mrs Lowo is a graduate of Psychology from the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ife. After years of study and acquiring a degree, she opted for shoe making. She is presently the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of KANDLEKIDS, a company that produces hand-made children footwear that include slippers, sandals, half-covered shoes and sneakers. The female shoemaker is barely one year in the industry.

She disclosed that before she began the shoe making business, she was shopping for her kids’ shoes abroad, especially from America.

“Sometimes, I did not like the fitting of shoes I got abroad, and at other times I wished I could change one thing or the other. I just could not find the style I really wanted for my kids. So after a while, I decided to fix the problem by learning how to make shoes in Nigeria and that was how it all began.

“My products are children’s shoes. I source raw materials locally from Lagos and Aba. My customers are men and women who love to give good gifts to children. It could be their children or other people’s children,” she explained.

How she started

She started her shoe making business with only N15,000 in September 2017. Out of the money, she bought the basic items such as leather, a buckle and a sole. She made her first sandals and posted it on social media. People loved it and ordered for more.

In her quest to acquire the necessary skills, she watched a lot of shoe making videos on YouTube and observed shoe makers in her area of residence, as well as learnt further under a vocational trainer in her church.

So far, she has produced different designs of shoes for children.

Challenges and prospects

According to her, she has experienced ups and downs in the business.

The major challenges include inadequate funds, difficulty in getting the needed raw materials and epileptic power supply.

But despite the aforementioned challenges, the future of the business, she said, is promising as many Nigerians have been expressing willingness to buy locally made products if the quality, design and price are good.

On whether she had ever accessed a bank loan to boost her business, Mrs Lowo said, “I have never gotten money from any financial organization. It will be great to get funding from these finance houses or from angel investors because there is so much to be done and lots of money to make from this business. For now, I reinvest whatever money I earn into the business. I once tried accessing a bank loan but the process was so stressful. They were almost requesting for my ancestors intestines,” she lamented.

The market

Doing her kind of business in a saturated market has made her to be creative, carving a niche to her advantage. In order to be unique in her own way, she came up with the idea of putting pictures, logos and write-ups on shoes made by her. “The first set of such shoes I produced had issues and I had to do a lot of testing and research to get it right and how to make the shoes more durable. The responses and patronage from customers have been very encouraging,” she said.

Her knowledge of psychology, she said, has helped her greatly in relating with her customers and understanding what they really want.

She has learnt to listen to her customers as well as take corrections.

Because she is learned, she researched what is trending and strives to meet up with new designs.

Mrs Lowo is a passionate shoe maker, she loves being innovative and creating new designs of shoes. “I am working on more concepts,” she stressed.