Get your ‘daily bread’ from Daily Bread M611

The is an abundance of business opportunities if you look in the ‘right’ place. It’s all about being able to identify a need and having the courage and resources to meet that need or come up with a solution that offers a return on investment (ROI).

Daily Bread M611 is a father-and-son operation that Mpho Setjeo created to offer much-needed services in an industrial area. He explains that he noticed the workers and offices needed someone to supply them with sandwiches because they were far from the shops.

Setjeo says, “For the first 2-weeks it was stressful because people didn’t know me and were worried about security issues. As time went by people warmed up to me and the business concept. We then identified a busy intersection with heavy morning traffic that could be our base area, and here we could sell to people going to school and other workplaces.”

His business idea, as simple as it is, is ingenious because it offers convenience. When asked about the name, he explains that being Christian, his faith is important, hence the M611 in the company name. “Growing up, we used to say the Lord’s prayer in Matthew 6 VS 11 – ‘Give us today our daily bread.’ So ‘Daily Bread’ originated from a prayer,” he elaborates.

Making it work

What led Setjeo to become an entrepreneur was basically a demand and a need that he had to fill. The target market needed food and beverages, so offering sandwiches made sense. The other reason was the scarcity of employment. In 2019 while job hunting for a graphic designer position without any success, he saw that the next best thing was to become his own boss.

However, running a business has its own challenges. Setjeo says that even though he was offering his target market what they needed and wanted, he still needed to build a customer base.

This is an ongoing process that involves:

• Being consistent: the results of 12 months of selling sandwiches in the same spot created a regular customer base.
• Being professional: how you handle your customers, interact with them, and treat them is important. Each customer needs to feel as though they are your one and only client.
• Presentation is important: entrepreneurs need to understand that presentation is everything, it can make or break your business.
• Embrace technology: tech-savvy customers appreciate flexibility and innovation. You need to have various payment options so you don’t lose a sale. Invest in resources that allow your customers to pay with a card or with their phones if they don’t have cash.

Setjeo says that once you get these right, you can focus on marketing the business. Luckily for him, he continues to take advantage of the opportunities technology brings as well as capitalises on the benefits of social media. At Daily Bread M611, marketing also includes strategically placing visually appealing boards that list the products and the price so new customers know what is on offer and how much it costs. “A business with no sign is a sign of no business,” Setjeo emphasises.

Setjeo explains that to keep and grow their customer base they make sure that they offer a variety of sandwiches, which is why doing research is important. He visits different places that sell sandwiches and studies their menu and finds ways to adapt those to his business. “We know that after a while customers get bored of buying the same thing even though there are sandwiches that will need to remain static, but there is always a need to rejuvenate the business to stay relevant,”
he adds.

Like everything in business, there are good days and bad days, the bad usually bring up fears. His fear is being complacent because that will be the death of the business. He needs to continue dreaming big and taking risks because taking risks leads to success.

For Setjeo success is able to lower the unemployment rate as an entrepreneur. He hopes that Daily Bread will play a role in lowering unemployment. He adds, “The 4-5 people we will be employing soon, will be us playing our part- My definition of success is fighting unemployment in our society.”

So is there a formula for success?

Well, Setjeo notes that there are nuggets entrepreneurs need to be aware of. “To be a successful entrepreneur, one needs to be consistent, professional, not drop the ball, and have great customer care. This has been my formula for success and becoming a successful entrepreneur.”

The beauty of entrepreneurship is that it’s different for every entrepreneur, for Daily Bread, each sandwich sold is an achievement. “Food is personal and buying it from us in the street makes this special. Calculating our profits and seeing how we are growing is my favourite aspect of entrepreneurship.” He adds, “The biggest one though is being able to make a living and having an income, especially if I can do that for someone who works for me.”

This father-son duo is setting a good example and proving that entrepreneurship doesn’t need one to have a complicated idea but an idea that solves a problem