Colleen Flower prides her business success, Colleen’s Handmade Sauces on the fact that her sauces are made of the best available natural ingredients that are sourced from local organic farmers.
A recent grandmother, Colleen saw a gap in the South African sauce market from her shopping experience and started a range of premium handmade products to meet the demands of customers who like her have fresh and organic tastes.
“My love for everything chilli is how Colleen’s Handmade Sauces came about. After experimenting in the kitchen looking for the perfect blend minus all the preservatives and nasties found in shop-bought sauces I created my all-time favourite Bird’s Eye Chili Sauce which I shared with all the other chilli addicts at the office”, Colleen explains on her business page.
“We are one of the very few companies in South Africa manufacturing Date Syrup sourcing dates from local farmers. Also branching out to healthy Chocolate-coated Dates using sugar-free palm oil-free chocolate sourced locally”, she told me in an exclusive interview about how she has improved her business significantly using technology.
Through Colleen’s experience, we also see how building businesses for many African women is also about bonding experiences, empowering families and building communities.
Through Colleen’s experience, we also see how building businesses for many African women is also about bonding experiences, empowering families and building communities.
To address concerns about business continuity even in her absence, since she is involved in every production, Colleen explained that the team makes adequate preparations.
“I do make every single batch. This is why knowing that I will be in the UK for a period, I was very busy the week before to make sure we had enough stock for dispatching”, she adds.
Colleen sources all her ingredients locally. This is especially important to her for 2 important reasons: sustainability and uniqueness.
There are few other brands out there but ours is unique because of the immense amount of care we put in. In today’s world where everything is about scaling down quality for profit, you will find that our output is not watered down”, she points out.
Building a community while building
Colleen’s handmade sauces are made from ingredients sourced from local farmers. For Colleen, that allows her to source fresh produce and build a community.
There is a growing movement of sustainable farmers, especially in South Africa, who are renowned for growing their products organically. And, these are the farmers Colleen loves to support.
“ I don’t go to the Johannesburg markets to buy farm products because I feel that there’s a lot of exploitation of farmers there”, Colleen tells me. “I buy directly from farmers because it is more profitable for them and I know where my ingredients come from”, she adds.
Using technology like Google to drive growth
For Colleen who started her business at 49, the internet is not an unfamiliar phenomenon. “I grew up in the age of Google”, she says. However, she did not know how much she could leverage the Internet to grow the business. So, she recalls her journey to doing more:
“My son introduced me to the Google Hustle Academy. He said ‘Mum why don’t you sign up for this? I feel it could help your business. And, I signed up for it. And, it was an amazing experience. I didn’t expect the course content to be that comprehensive.”
At the Google Hustle Academy, Colleen was exposed to the rudiments of business building. She had lessons on financing, bookkeeping, and marketing and did her SWAT analysis. She also participated in competitions and defended her ideas before the faculty.
“It changed the way I look at the business afterwards. And, I started using tools like Google Ads to give the business global visibility and it improved sales significantly”, she explained.
Colleen’s Challenges and Successes
For Colleen, transitioning from being a lecturer for 14 years to becoming a sauce maker was an introduction to an entirely new world.
“I didn’t know much about regulations in the food industry. So that was a challenge so it had to learn everything from scratch”, she said.
This early challenge later became a major win for Colleen as she was able to acquire enough knowledge to dominate her space.
Colleen also had to solve the challenges of financing and cash flow management. “You know, I was new to the retail system where we supply stores and there is a payment period”, she shared.
During her learning time at the Google Hustle Academy, Colleen shared classes with a lot of women from across Africa. According to her, they enjoyed a camaraderie and a set of similar experiences.
One such experience is the temptation to give up. According to her, “ We face a lot of challenges these days and you feel that you are running the business to keep the staff employed because it is so tough out”.
