By: ‘Moelo Motsiri
MASERU
Nthabiseng Letlala, a 25 year-old Lesotho School of Crafts graduate in Catering Management makes a bold move of starting her own catering business.
Her business, Nthah’s Cakes is a professional catering business baking affordable cakes for different occasions like weddings, graduations, birthdays to mention few.
Inspired by her Neo Moeketsi who is also into the baking industry, Nthabiseng stepped into this industry back in 2022, baking the cakes of different designs.
“I have always liked business since my childhood. At my high school, I use to cook and sell food to the factory workers in the morning before going to school, that is where I concluded that indeed I will be my own boss one day,” she said.
The name Nthah’s Cakes comes from her name, Nthabiseng, with the aim of honoring herself as well as being proud of its ownership. “I wanted to name my business after me as an indicator that it belongs to me. And I wanted to be proud that I finally did what I have always wanted to do,” she noted.
Nthabiseng stated that that Nthah’s Cakes really performs well since its creation, allowing her to earn a living and helping her mom. She said that she advertises online to get customers, she also gets them by the preferences of her other customers, relatives and people who know her.
The young entrepreneur noted that she even buys tools expanding her business after the sales. She said that she is really grateful for its good performance.
“I feel so happy when people buys my cakes, keeps on coming back and giving me other customers, that makes me so happy and it contributes a lot to my business growth and it shows that people are happy for my services,” she said
Nthabiseng added that it has always been her wish to help her mom and her siblings, mentioning it as one of the reasons, she started business at a young age. She said that she feels blessed when it performs well to the point that she is able to help them.
With her years in this industry, Nthabiseng said that her business got so many challenges. She said that one of them is that in winter, it does not perform well, but eventually recovers at the festive season.
She also, talked about the challenge where she gets accused or blamed for the poor quality. “Sometimes a client sends someone to fetch her order, then that person does not handle the cake with care and the person claims that she took it like that from me, that becomes a challenge because I get the blame for that person’s mistake,” she said.
Each and every customer want the type of cake they want. Nthabiseng maintained that some clients want the cakes that have their photos and it becomes a challenge where she will go to town where they do those photos and sometimes told that the machine does not work.
“It becomes a very serious challenge that can make me lose customers, because they will be forced to change the design they wanted and that becomes a challenge that can make them to go somewhere else if they do not want to change,” she noted.
Despite all the challenges, Nthabiseng said that she prays and work hard for her business growth. Mentioning that she wants her business to grow and find herself doing the cakes for the respected people like our Majesty King Letsie.
Her ending became simple, she advised the upcoming entrepreneurs to be passionate because it is not all the time that customers will keep coming. She also said that there are tough times in business, where it does not make sales at all and that time needs patient people who strives for improvement rather than loosing hope.