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Kaffé Koffee is the first 24/7 coffee shop in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania that roasts its coffee freshly every day and offers authentic coffee with options of non-dairy and original desserts. Muntazir Hussein, founder, and owner of Kaffé Koffee talks about his business. How did you start your business? We started on the 1st of July, 2020 as a coffee shop and then invested in the roastery to get into the small-scale industry within the country. There were hardly any roasters who had the facilities to provide a good coffee supply not only to the locals but also to the export market. So far, we have been expanding into different locations since the establishment was very well accepted by the current market in Tanzania. We are the official under 10 roasters recognized by the Tanzanian coffee board. We currently have 3 locations, two in Dar es Salam and one in Zanzibar. We plan to open a second roastery in Zanzibar because of the international and local market. We are partners to different franchises to which we supply. What is the competition like in Tanzania? Being the first Tanzanian to own a roastery in the country, it becomes a challenge in the market because I'm competing with foreign investors. Nevertheless, the quality and service that we provide are exceptional. We, in Tanzania, have one of the best coffee that is out there in the world. As a result, not only do we compete locally but also internationally. We have several international coffee companies that come and buy coffee from us such as Starbucks and Costa. As we expand, our vision is to grow country-wide with coffee shops and also supply coffee internationally. How did the pandemic affect your business? I started when the virus was still out there and everybody was closing their businesses. I felt it was the best time to create a business that would entertain and give people hope in life. We started with around $2,000 worth of investment and now we are grossing over a billion shillings in revenue. The pandemic did not affect us because we had people that always came and supported the business. We also had some that stayed back home but continued to order products from us. Tanzania always fought against the whole notion of the virus. Our late president, President Magufuli sort of denied the fact that we needed certain measures to protect ourselves. He proposed that we would rather take a different route towards the virus, focusing on keeping our immune system healthy through physical activities. He believed that if you divide and block people especially in a third-world country, people would die of starvation and the economy would suffer greatly. This helped us a lot to continue doing business. Our late president passed away as a result of heart conditions and we now have the first lady president in Tanzania. Mama Samia Suluhu, our president, has been doing an amazing job so far. She has taken a different route. She takes all extreme measures to protect our country and our people and especially with the foreign investors. Our economy has been booming and we have been doing business very comfortably. The pandemic gave us more time to grow. Do you have an online presence? The world is moving fast, people want everything in a click. From the first day, we established our businesses on social media. However, there are certain few drawbacks because Instagram and Facebook still don't have online shopping in Tanzania. We developed our app which you can download and place orders from anywhere. We continue to see how we can develop further and improve online sales. In Tanzania, the culture is such that everyone is still learning about the new trend and technology is not at the highest rise. People want to go out, touch and have that physical feeling of things. As a result, we have more people coming to our physical stores compared to the online platforms. As a business owner in this industry, what is your philosophy? I believe in providing the best quality that is available on the market. Being consistent when it comes to the quality of products we offer across different locations. Having a service that complements the quality and consistency and finally, a price that must be matched with the quality of the product. How did you find Loyverse? I was referred to Loyverse by a colleague of mine. Once we gave it a trial, we were satisfied and happy. Especially the part where you can see the sales reports and manage inventory. Although there are certain things that we still haven't explored yet, we have had a great experience so far and are interested in partnering with Loyverse in the future. What advice do you have for other business owners? It would be of course to take up Loyverse not only as a startup but also intermediate level or an expert level. I think Loyverse is an extremely friendly platform, the customer support and the right features are there for any business to use. I have personally referred Loyverse to several businesses.

Hi @Loussaloon123, It is not possible to scan items into inventory using your Phone. You will need to have a barcode scanner connected to your PC in order to do this in your Back Office.

Hi @Mwingi, you make make an api call to get the list of items - https://developer.loyverse.com/docs/#tag/Items/paths/~1items/get Once you have done this, you can make another call to get the store names and associated store id - https://developer.loyverse.com/docs/#tag/Stores/paths/~1stores/get From this you can identify the IDs of stores and items.

Hi @Mwingi, we've got the Inventory endpoint to that. https://developer.loyverse.com/docs/#tag/Inventory/paths/~1inventory/post

Mimo Berry is a beauty business based in Accra, Ghana. Having started from humble beginnings 3-years ago, Mimo Berry has experienced a lot of growth and is now known for its colorful hand-drawn nail art. We met with Mirian, a self-taught nail technician and owner of Mimo Berry, to learn more about her business and experience so far. How did you start Mimo Berry? I am a self-taught nail technician. The business started from my living room with one chair, one table, and a few products - practicing on myself, my mother, and friends. Within the same year, I moved on to offering home services. Later, I partnered with someone and rented a space in their salon. With a table and a chair, I ran my business and paid monthly rent. After a year, the person I partnered with wanted to close her business. I decided to take the space and had three more people join me. The following year, there was a need for expansion so, we took more space and expanded to having the hair, nails, and pedicure section. This year, we will take on new space because our client base has grown remarkably. In September, we will be moving to a location 6 times bigger than our current place. We would also be adding more services. How did you teach yourself? Did you have to watch lots of videos on YouTube? It was 10% YouTube videos along with a lot of reading. It was easier for me to read and replay in my head than for me to watch videos. So, I did a lot of reading and practicing. For example, I will read why things are a certain way, then try to practice. This method helped me understand better. What makes your business unique or stand out from others? We at Mimo berry do not see other people as a competition since we focus on our customers. Because of our quality of work, we get good feedback from our customers expressing how we pay good attention to them and offer the best service. We do great designs that our customers love. We have our product line as well, and other salons buy from our brand. We try to build a family so that it is easier for us to communicate and work together to give the best service to our customers. How was your business affected by the covid-19 pandemic? I am grateful for the blessings that came along with COVID for our business. We were only closed for the lockdown enforced by the government. I think it was about 3-weeks and we were able to pay our employees full salary. We had to get a hand-wash station outside the shop for customers and observe other safety protocols. Some of our clients got sick and were kind enough to inform us. Sales might have dropped a little because people were scared, but it was still enough to get us by. Do you use an online platform for sales? I have had a lot of my customers from Instagram as well as Google business. Instagram has been one of the mediums I have used to showcase my work. We have a lot of foreign clients, and they mostly find us on Google search. When they come to Accra and search for the best nail salon in Accra, they locate my business. On Instagram, people have also seen my work, followed me, and also come to experience the service. Did you experience any increase in sales from your online channels? Before the pandemic, I was doing press-on nails customized to fit. I would send this out through a dispatch service to customers. When the pandemic hit, I used Instagram as a platform to market the press-on nails. As a result, even when I was home, we were still making some money because even though no one was going out, people could not do without their nails done. What is the philosophy behind your business? I want to create a great workforce. Something that is going to make us take over the nail and beauty industry. It is all about giving back to society, helping women in Accra and the world to understand that you can start something small and make it big. So, in the long run, we want to create job opportunities for women and the future to run training programs. I do that now but at a fee because we cannot have the freebies for now. How did you find Loyverse? I found Loyverse through my brother. He is an IT person, and I had complained to him about my finances. He helped me install security cameras and set up Loyverse POS with a thermal printer. It tracks everything - our costs and revenue. I use the dashboard when I am not at the shop and need to see how the business is doing for the day. Since I do nail supplies, I always advise other businesses that buy products from us to use Loyverse. When they do not know how to set it up, I call my brother or give them his number, and then they contact him for help. I think so far we have got in several people who use it. What Loyverse features did you find useful for your business? When I can issue a receipt, it creates no room for loss, and everything is tracked. Also, the stock-taking is very accurate for me, and it leaves no room for mistakes. You mentioned earlier that you read a lot, can you tell me more about that? I did a lot of forums and articles. I could go on Google search and type “Why do acrylic nails lift” and then I will have to find different examples. This method worked for me. A video is one person telling you one thing, and you have to watch 1000 videos to get different opinions. Whereas in a forum, everybody could agree on one thing and present several examples. That is why it works for me. What also changed my way of thinking was reading a popular book called The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. The book is not in the line of business, but it changed my mindset, and it made me believe that I could do anything. Another book was The Secret by Rhonda Byrne, it helped me on my journey as well. What advice do you have for anyone just starting their own beauty business? Start small, be focused, and be consistent. It gets sad sometimes, it gets very lonely, sometimes you do not understand certain things, but with time you will get it, you will be better. There will be hard times, good times, and times you feel like nobody can help, and then there will be times where everything will fall into place.

Hi @Jalmood, there is no option for creating new Employees using the API.

Hi @BDCFO, at the moment payment API is not available on our side. See our API documentation.

Hi @Haricot, it is not possible to have barcodes with embedded prices. You can only have barcode with embedded weight.

Hi @tvcntnslu, there are different types of reports available in the Back office. Have you checked it out?

Hi @Edwin47, you can use the API to get receipts and filter by any period.

Hi @YUIKJOO, try sending the request without the ID. The ID must have a specific format. You have "esse" as ID which doesn't meet the format.

Hi @Andreait, there is a list of compatible receipt printers which also includes Bluetooth printers. If you printer is not on the list, it means that your printer has not been tested and cannot assure you that it will work properly.

Hi @Mohammed, at the moment, there is no exact way of doing this since only the person charging the customer is recorded on the receipt

Hi @jogariv, at the moment, such an option is not available.

You are welcome