Candle Hawker.

The Journey to freedom begins with the first step we make in life, which is the very first step we make as infants. That particular step matters most in life because those that fail to make this first step ends up crawling.

As a Child, I grew up in a society where the rich gets richer and the poor poorer but what cause this is the ability of the rich to move forward and the inability of the poor to move neither forward nor backward.

All my life, I have learned the importance of moving, moving is walking and walking to me means WORKING perhaps that was why I joined my Dad in the Candle trade at a very tender age and that was FREEDOM.

My Dad deals on Candles, he sold varieties of candles, I mean assorted kinds of candles and his shop was in a good spot, he had numerous customers and he supplied candles to churches and so many other organizations and individuals.

So many people knew him and come from different parts of the country to buy from him, he was a major distributor for two Manufacturers and the society we lived in favored him because there was always power failure but apart from that, there was always a demand for candles during wedding, sports and other activities. My Dad is a hard working man but his only problem is that he is a little bit old fashioned.

The Original Candle Man was well known to everyone.

The Original Candle Man was well known to everyone.

My Dad never thought of expansion though his shop brings in substantial revenue because no matter what the situation might be and how good or bad the day was, there is always reasonable profit at the end of every week but I was perplexed the very day I saw my Dad's statement of account.

He owns only this particular shop and as far as i am concerned, he does no other business so with such an amount of money in his account then my Father is a Millionaire, he didn't live big and our family was one of those middle class household in the city but whoever sees how much my Dad worth in cash will honestly believe that he has enough to contest for the presidency. My Dad was not educated so all his desire was to make sure that all his kids have good education so he made sure that my shop attendance doesn't conflict with my school works.

I later graduated with first class Hon. in Business Management, a course my father insisted that i study instead of Law or Medicine.

Everyone was surprise when i rejected an offer for employment at the Ministry of Trade and Industry, the Banks called but i rejected all offers in the big corporation. My Dad's shop is where the money flows so that was how i became a manager in the shop.

The first thing i achieved as a Manager was the establishment of a new shop at the urban city and within six months of joining my Dad, we established two more new shops. It is not that my Dad is not business oriented but like i said earlier, he is a little bit old fashioned, one of those contended men you can imagine.

One year in the shop brought a lot of innovations and changes which my Dad never thought of and by now, we have a truck and two vans which we use in transporting goods to customers. All our customers needed to do was to place an order, pay money into our bank account and the goods will be delivered on their door steps.

Our fliers were every where and there was 10mins Television info commercial every day.

With the help of couple of friends, i established more contacts with more super markets and retail stores and got a distributorship right with four more manufacturers. Our Business kept growing though there were times when things are dull but no matter the situation, we always laugh to the Bank and the fact that almost all our major customers were at our reach made things very easy for us.

My Dad was not so old but he wanted to retire but i told him that his retirement gift from me will be a factory; I wanted us to go into manufacturing because we have all it takes to set up a Candle Making Factory. This was an Idea my Dad never thought of so he was a bit reluctant when i proposed it.

The saying like father like son has a lot to do with me and my Dad, he was a very hard working man who doesn't give up no matter the load and i am that same person so knowing me very well, he simply asked me to build the business and leave a good print.

Everything was to my reach and there was money to spend so constructing the factory to a high standard was a dream come true and six months into it, the Original Candle Man was no longer a three shop Business but a corporate Factory which makes varieties of Candles and the best candles in town.

My Dad did not hide his happiness at my achievement within a short period in the business, he has been in this trade all his life and never thought of owing a factory but you see that is the difference between the new generation which i found myself in, we are quite different from the old guys though they think big but we think bigger.

After two years of what i will honestly call tremendous and adventurous years, we had a rank of 60 employees and outworked all our competitors.

You see, my Dad began this candle business at a tender age of seven and had no basic education, his parents could not afford to send him to school so he hawked candles to help put food on the family's table and that was where the name Original came into life because he called himself the Original Candle Man.

He dresses on his only good cloth and walked the whole city hawking candles, he started this trade with just a stick of candle given to him during a night Virgil and It took him five months to save enough to buy a packet of candle.

Those who laughed at him then today buys Candles made from the Factory he built. That is where i stand in life that whatever will be will be and it doesn't matter how you start or what you start with, you can begin with a bottle of beverage and some day own your own beverage plant because no great fortune fell from above, they were all worked for so pursue your dream and keep walking.

But you can equally start your own candle business today...