ABY Events: SIPEC (Sherai’s Initiative for Promoting Entrepreneurs in Cameroon) – The Launch

As much as I love fashion, I do realise that it doesn’t come first. As a young professional, one must strive to be better than their utmost best. My love for Jimmy Choos can only be reinforced by how hard I work to afford them 😉 I love seeing young people (especially Cameroonians) successfully exploiting their entrepreneurial skills. That’s exactly why I was beaming with pride and excitement when I glimpsed the SIPEC story a few days ago via Facebook. I just couldn’t pass up the chance to feature it and encourage others to join the movement.

The Concept

SIPEC, an acronym for Sherai’s Initiative for Promoting Entrepreneurs in Cameroon. This initiative seeks to promote the spirit of Entrepreneurship in Cameroon. This is done through identifying entrepreneurs and small businesses and creating a platform to market their services and products. The intention of SIPEC is to connect entrepreneurs with their target market in a fun and light hearted fashion. We offer a large room, beautiful music, nice chilled drinks, well marinated finger foods and a mix of intelligent people. We create an environment where ideas can be exchanged and business partnerships can be formed.

SIPEC events will always bring together all kinds of professionals. It is a place for entrepreneurs to show off what they do, it is a place where established companies come to look for new clients, partners, suppliers, investors. It is also a place where people who are not yet entrepreneurs come to get inspiration. There are many things businesses need to succeed, grow larger and expand to new territories. These can be: financing, advertising, mentorship, you name it, SIPEC events bring all these people together, so you can do all these in one evening.

The Brain Behind The Brand

Etonde is the founder and CEO of Sheraiz Delightz, an Events Management Company in Douala, Cameroon. SIPEC is an initiative she started to help budding entrepreneurs like herself meet their target clients. Etonde has held many sales roles in the past 6 years and she understands the challenges of closing deals with clients. She knows people refuse to do business with you for a various number of reasons, but really they are not saying no to you but to your product. A client needs to see that passion in your eyes and how that passion can be transferred to them to make that decision to buy. Etonde through SIPEC wants to see companies work with each other, she wants Entrepreneurs to move from small to big. She wants small companies to work with large companies and large companies with small companies. “We all need each other”, she says.

The Event

Sheraiz Delightz, an events planning company launched SIPEC 1^st Edition under the theme: Networking, a key tool for successful business at the White House Restaurant in Bonapriso, Douala. It gathered about 150 people who were a mix of entrepreneurs, media personnel, and Cameroon’s professionals. The mix was rich and the conversations were unending. It was almost hard to get people to move to the front of the hall and listen to the speaker.

Etonde aka Sherai had one objective for this evening, to get people to network, to talk to complete strangers, to exchange business cards, to create partnerships and to close deals.

The event introduced 10 companies/budding entrepreneurs, viz; Evavivres Poultry, Ace Technology, ABCS (Algima Business Consulting Services), BSI Cameroon(Business Solutions International), GLA Consulting, Teks Design, TradeLand Group, Santa Helena Beach Resort, Moland Resort and The Bridge International School. See more info about these companies below.

We are proud to say the event was a success, the buzz is on, entrepreneurs are connecting with well-established companies, entrepreneurs are connecting with other entrepreneurs. On Monday afternoon, barely 36 hours after SIPEC 1^st Edition, The Bridge International School, one of the entrepreneurs promoted on Saturday asked for the contact information of AVT Media, one of the sponsors who offered free photos and videos to SIPEC, AVT Media covered the entire show and is responsible for the beautiful pictures you see on our website and social networks and the videos currently available on YouTube. The Bridge International School also has their eyes on Moland Beach Resort, another entrepreneur promoted on Saturday. Moland Beach is your dream getaway destination. It’s what we have been dreaming about. Jet Skis, water sports, nice food along the beach, space to relax and enjoy nature. The Bridge can already imagine the kids from the school having the time of their life on beautiful resort along shores of Idenau, South West Region of Cameroon.

Were TradeLand Group’s ushers polite or what? How many events have you attended in Cameroon where ushers move around asking you if you are ok, if you need anything else, if you are enjoying the event, if you would like to improve the next SIPEC event? Trade Land Group offers ushers who are different, who go the extra mile, who take initiative and do things a little different. Whose idea was this? Guess? BSI Cameroon, another entrepreneur being promoted. BSI prides itself as the company that wants to change the one thing we all complain about in Cameroon but do nothing about. Can you guess what that is? Offering training on Customer Service. “We need to know how to treat our clients right and with respect” said one of the partners at BSI Cameroon.

Etonde could not help but smile when she saw all these companies connecting on Saturday. The buzz continued on Monday as people kept calling her to get in touch with some other company they didn’t get a chance to talk to. We probably need more time to exchange during the next SIPEC event, we should probably have more speed networking games. “Etonde shared with her MC, Thomas Agbor Nkongho a few days after the event.”

What Next?

SIPEC events will be held quarterly in different parts of the country.

The next edition is scheduled for Thursday April 24^th 2014 at the White House Restaurant. The secret to why we will use the same venue will be disclosed to us on this day. “Your business needs my business’s help to soar. You do not know it now, but when you see what I am doing during SIPEC 2^nd Edition, how passionately I carry out my services and talk about my products you will want to go home with my business card.” Said the passionate Entrepreneur.

The Sponsors

DHL Global Forwarding – www.dhl.com

AVT Media – www.avtmedia.tv

Acmar Media Group – www.acmarpartners.com

Rainbow Sports – www.rainbowfootball.com

White House Restaurant 

Get Involved!

For any information on how you can be part of SIPEC, check them out on www.sipec.co.uk or send an email to sipecinfo@gmail.com. You can apply to be part of the SIPEC team or you can partner as an entrepreneur, company or sponsor.

Are you making an impact and using your entrepreneurial skills to inspire others?  Share your story! Get people talking about your brand. Email artbecomesyou@yahoo.com.

Love & Light xx

Lydie