06 Jun Still Standing
Business owners tell us how.
From small family run and owned businesses, skilled traders and entrepreneurs to medium sized businesses and established factories in Supermarkets – COVID19 has swung them an unprecedented curveball. The President announced the national lockdown on March 23 2020 and as families nation-wide prepared themselves for the unknown by panic shopping and sheer panic in general, small and medium business owners from across the country doubled down on whatever course they had decided on to mitigate the inevitable damages that their businesses would incur during the national lockdown placements.
In a matter of days, media reports on medium sized businesses such as a family run winery struggling to retain the very hard won wine exporting market share whilst dealing with the problem of what to do with the bottled products ready for shipment; flooded the airwaves and business columns.
Amidst the eventual government funding injection solution to help with the much needed financial relief for business that have lost out on business and still need to pay wages, a number of community sustaining business have been adapting and straddling the lines of maintaining the profitability, whilst complying with Lockdown rules.
These business owners and managers tell us how:
Parklane Spar
“Because we anticipated some restricting measures after the first case of The COVID19 in South Africa was reported to have been in Pietermaritzburg, we came together and started putting delivery services in place. Although we could’ve never imagined the magnitude of what the National lockdown would entail, our saving grace was that we are an essential service, our Delhi took a huge knock as its very popular.” – Gary Strange (Manager)
Phoenix wholesale
“The majority of our customers at Phoenix wholesalers are Spaza shops in and around Pietermaritzburg and the rural outskirts. These are considered essential services and because the stock we sell to them are essential needs- we didn’t lose out on much. The only thing that limited the continuous cash flow was the restricted traveling. Initially, we did struggle to get permits to deliver to the outskirts but in the end we survived the initial stages because we have good financial planning measures in place.”- Mohammed (Owner)
Plumbing solutions
“We are a two-man business and business was good before the lockdown. Both our partners and our secretary’s husband have stable jobs. This continued to bring in income for our respective families which was a huge relief since that was our primary concern. Our overheads are very low since our place of business is on my property…. All we really did was wait it out. Personal savings really helped. Other than that, although we have lost out on monthly income, our business isn’t in danger of closing down.” – Peter (Plumbing solutions)
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