Esther Gathambo has opened a store called Sawubona at Made Market precinct in Hamilton East. Photo / Ashlee DeCaires
Esther Gathambo has opened a store called Sawubona at Made Market precinct in Hamilton East. Photo / Ashlee DeCaires
Kenyan-born social entrepreneur Esther Gathambo, of Hamilton, says she is on a mission to transform African communities and preserve traditional art and craft forms.
Through her business Sawubona, Gathambo has been selling handcrafted homeware online and at local markets for three years. She has now opened a physical store at the Made market precinct in Hamilton East.
Gathambo first came to New Zealand in 2018, after spending most of her life in Kenya.
She was the first one in her family to attend university and experienced several challenges during her younger years, including difficult access to clean running water and reliable electricity - many of the everyday things Kiwis take for granted.
“I grew up in a rural town and it was a very small community. My neighbours were my family. I was brought up by the community so my way of thinking has always been, I have to take care of other people,” she said.
She was also surrounded by single mothers raising their children without a social welfare system.
The Made market precinct just opened last weekend. Photo / Danielle Zollickhofer
“They may not have had book skills, but they all ran their own small businesses. My grandma had a small shop selling produce and artisan goods, and I used to go there and support her,” Gathambo said.
Gathambo currently sells products made by more than 60 artisans from Kenya, Rwanda and South Africa and wants to empower them and their families, while sustaining traditional craft and art forms.
Sawubona is a greeting in Zulu and translates roughly to “I see you”.
Opening a physical store has always been one of Gathambo’s goals. When she saw that Made had some availability, she rang up straight away.
“Made ... is a middle ground between the markets I was attending and a stand-alone store ... In fact, a lot of the tenants at Made are people I have been to local markets with,” she said.
“I didn’t have a big budget for the store fit-out, so I had to do a few things on my own and with the help of friends and family,” she says.
One of the biggest challenges of setting up shop was getting a large order of products to New Zealand on time.
“The artisans took around seven months to make the items, partly due to some difficult family circumstances, so there were real moments of stress where I was unsure that they would arrive ahead of opening. Fortunately, the order arrived in the nick of time.”
Gathambo also credits New Zealand charity All Good Ventures, run by Hamilton-based business-people Heather and Rod Claycomb, for getting the store up and running: They not only gave her a grant, but also mentored her.
To find out more about Sawubona, check out the website.
