On Thursday 5th September 2019, Franchise Business Development Services (FBDS Nigeria) organised an event Naija Business Scale-up on business expansion at Oriental Hotel in Lagos.
This was created to scale and expand proven and viable Nigerian brands across the country, and to global markets using the globally proven and successful franchising business model. Beneficiaries were intended to learn to apply the principles and systems operated by globally most expanded business models, giving them the opportunity to franchise their businesses out to investors, resulting in rapid and standardized expansion. They would be further supported to exhibit to investors, and to launch their expansion or franchise out to investors with a pilot roll out.
In line with this agenda and the goal to provide aggregated support that would produce a new breed of globally expanded Nigerian brands, Naija Business Scale-Up was proudly supported by a wide category of organisations such as The Nigeria Competitiveness Project (NICOP) of GIZ-SEDIN; Fate Foundation; Fidelity Bank; Lagos State Employment Trust Fund; The Bank Of Industry; Africa Franchise Institute; Nigeria Association of Franchise Business Members among others. The scheme was equally proudly endorsed by successful Nigerian franchises with free giveaway of their products and services, in support of a challenge hunt for undiscovered brands considered as Nigeria’s next potential successful franchises. The brands included Miniso Nigeria; SLOT; House Of Tara; CleanAce Drycleaners; and Pointek Limited. Daily Independent Newspaper; Arise TV; Connect Nigeria; NaijaBrandChic and Trudis Media were the media partners who supported the event.
The excited participants agreed in unison that the orientation exercise was a most valueable information about how they could go about scaling and expanding their businesses. One of the participants, the CEO of Ivy League Collections, took to her Instagram page to share her testimonials where she stated, “I learnt that the biggest challenge businesses face in Nigeria is their inability to build strong sustainable systems”, she went further to list a number of other reasons she considered franchising her business.
It is hoped that as next steps, a number of these entrepreneurs whose businesses meet the required criteria, will be supported through a thorough franchise development procedure over the next couple of months at Fate Foundation. At this phase, they and their management team will be exposed to practical development of standard operating procedures for their businesses; implementation of close-gap solutions to identified expansion gaps; coaching, training and certification. Nigeria will be expecting the emergence of a new breed of franchise champion brands that will soon be exhibiting to investors and commence their expansion programme across the country and internationally. The convener of the event, Mr. Chiagozie Nwizu expressed his excitement about the progress his vision for building new roads to social, enterprise and economic development having made consistent progress with results. He thanked the organizations that supported the scheme to success and looked forward to a mutual value as the Nigeria SME sector derives new hope to business sustainability, growth and expansion through franchising.
