‘With tech, we’re transforming branding’

Hafsah Umar is a 24-year-old graduate of Sociology and Anthropology from Baze University, Abuja. She founded the 5Eleven Group along with her brothers, Muhammad Umar, 19 and Is’haq Umar, 16. Both brothers are students of Economics and Architecture at Baze University respectively. In this interview, Hafsah speaks about how the group is transforming the branding, […]

Hafsah Umar is a 24-year-old graduate of Sociology and Anthropology from Baze University, Abuja. She founded the 5Eleven Group along with her brothers, Muhammad Umar, 19 and Is’haq Umar, 16. Both brothers are students of Economics and Architecture at Baze University respectively. In this interview, Hafsah speaks about how the group is transforming the branding, gifting and homes business by adopting cutting edge technology.

How did you start the 5Eleven Group?

The 5Eleven Group is a company with four subsidiaries – 5Eleven Gifting, 5Eleven Branding, 5Eleven Homes and 5Eleven Studios. I started the subsidiaries along with my brothers in 2014, so we are about six years into the business.

5Eleven Gifting is a company that takes care of all your gifting needs, be it corporate gifts, birthday gifts, anniversary gifts or even weddings and events souvenirs. We work with every budget and delivery excellent service.

5Eleven Branding is a branding firm that focuses on building and branding businesses. From the business name, logos, letterheads, advertisement, we teach start-up businesses how to package and attract clients in the least difficult way.

5Eleven Homes is a bespoke furniture and home decor company, we make handcrafted furniture from scratch, deliver, install and decorate your spaces for you.

5Eleven Studios is a photography and cinematography company that covers birthdays, anniversary, naming ceremonies, weddings, product shoot and more.

With all these activities, could you describe a typical day at work for you?

A typical workday for us is having a progressive day at the office, a lot of walk-in clients. A busy day at the workshop and traffic on our social media handles.

As young entrepreneurs, what are the key hurdles you have to cross?

We faced a lot of challenges while setting the company up. One of them was getting clients to trust us with their works initially, but we don’t have that challenge anymore because we now have a huge clientele base. The challenges we now face are for those of the third parties, especially the services of delivery agencies that we engage.

What projects are you working on?

We have had to work on many projects. Top most of them is Project Amina which is about furniture and home decorations. We have Project Zurie which is still about home furniture and decorations. We have a stand alone furniture project, tagged Project Zainab; there is also Project Isma which we are working on for delivery on furniture and home decorations; then we are into a project on Ramadan Gift Packages, especially during this period of the Coronavirus pandemic.

What are you doing to empower other youths in this entrepreneurial path?

We hire people and make them professionals. If they want to leave and start their ventures, we put them through it. That’s what we do to empower others.

What is your staff strength?

There are various types of engagement but we have over 100 people working under 5Eleven Group.

How do you plan to expand this business in the coming years?

Because we are currently a fraction of TCC, our father’s worksite, where we operate from, we are working on our own permanent site and headquarters of about 100 by 50 square metres. When that is completed, we’ll move to having branches all over Nigeria and eventually across the world. This is our dream and we are pursuing that swiftly.

What advice do you have for youths, especially the unemployed?

As an unemployed youth, you should never let the fear of funding, not having enough connections, and competition stop you from achieving what you know is yours. Start now, not tomorrow. Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. The market is a big place so you just have to understand how it works. Do something, no matter how small it is, it’s worth it.