Tony Gidado, one of Nigeria’s bold and creative Young Entrepreneurs, excites Abuja residents with his latest company ‘The Errand Boy’. Tony in a chat with our reporter narrates his foray into the concierge and lifestyle business and the challenges of doing business in Nigeria. Excerpts:
Tell us a little about yourself?
Where do I begin when there is so much to talk about? I am 2009 graduate of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. I majored in Electrical Engineering to be precise. After that I went to South Africa for a professional course on home automation.
Home automation is basically on building smarter homes when you get to know what is happening in your house through a handheld phone. I have been into that business for the past there years now. About my personality, I think I’m a risk taker. I believe risk taking should be a part of everyday activity because people that take risks never really achieve their goals.
Lets talk more about one of the companies you operate which is calledErrandBoy. Why the name ErrandBoy in the first place?
One day I was sitting down and thinking that why not do something and give a name to a company that will appeal to everybody. The name ErrandBoy alone is very catchy and it sells itself. So when you hear the name you don’t have to go about wondering what they do or the kind of services they give. As you hear the name ErrandBoy, it just tells you this is what it is. That’s why I chose it.
There must have been a definite reason why you decided to float this company. What was the driving idea?
After work one day, I was lying down hungry, so I was thinking about who I could send to go and get me a meal. The distance where I wanted to eat and my residence was about 8 mile radius. So I said even if I was going to send somebody, who would I send? I didn’t find anybody to send and I told myself that there is no business like that in Asokoro or even the entire Abuja.
So I decided to start something that would make life better for people such that when you get to call for things like this it will be easier for you. Then I told myself that I should start up something like this.
There are people like me out there who really want to get help in one or two places, need to be in some places at the same time but cannot achieve that. Through ErrandBoy you can achieve something like that. It is a service that actually replaces you somewhere else. Whatever it is, we can do it-hotel reservation, booking of flights or anything you know you cannot do by yourself, ErrandBoy can do it for you.
How has your training as an Electrical Engineer impacted or influenced the decisions you take so far as this business is concerned?
As an engineer, you are being taught to be nurtured and cultured. You have principles on how to run your projects. I think that has helped me immensely on how to manage a business of this sort. It is really complex.
The name might sound easy but the task is really complex. You know, arranging someone else’s life is not easy. But I think that is how I have been able to manage this.
Would you say this business is worth taking the risk? Is it worth investing into it?
Technically, ErrandBoy is a service that manages your life. Imagine if you have a multi-national company sending some people into Abuja; say 5, 10 or 50 members of staff and then you have to make hotel reservation for them according to their budget.
You have to keep them in a prestigious hotel, using your money to do all that, and they pay you after you are through. You have to prepare their hotels, handle their logistics, if they have an event, you make sure the event goes well. That is basically what ErrandBoy does.
It is really capital intensive, and they pay you an agreed percentage after you have delivered. Yes it is really profitable!
How exactly do you carry out this business?
For the hotels, we have a concierge agreement with different hotels, what they do is to give us bookings at discounted rates. If you go through us, you will get hotel rates cheaper than the normal cost at the hotel you may want to lodge in.
When it comes to the logistics, in the sense of car hiring and things like that, we have a fleet of good cars. It also depends on the kind of cars that you want; we make that happen for you. When it comes to food delivery, just to ensure that we can beat traffic, we have motorbikes that deliver from one point to another as you may desire it