Eugene Ngugi — transcript

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This transcript is generated automatically by YouTube and has not been checked by a person. It misspells names and mishears words, particularly around Kenyan English and company names, so read it as a guide to the conversation rather than a quotable record. Each timestamp opens the video at that moment.

0:03 [Music] good morning ladies and gentlemen and welcome back to African do episode 8 today we venture into the world of design and it's my great pleasure to have a good friend uh Eugene gugi a managing director of U planning Interiors limited one of the top interior design Farms interior design and a lot more nowadays but evolved from interior design in Kenya and does a lot of work regionally and hopefully into the future on the continent uh so Eugene welcome to African do podcast thank you thank where we tell stories of Africans doing MH uh so welcome and your please introduce yourself to Yes um thanks uh Leonard uh as he said my name is Eugene googi I run a business called planning Interiors limited um I turned 60 a couple of days ago so this was also pause for me to reflect on my career I've been in the industry for over 30 33 34 years now

1:13 yeah so from humble beginnings we've come very far and it's so interesting to see how the profession is evolving moving forward so I'm in a place now of reevaluating my contribution uh to this industry I am a businessman running planning Interiors but I am a designer first and foremost okay excellent so so Eugene um generationally you you you said you have turned 60 yes and design is not is not really mainstream you know at the time yeah so maybe we can just delve back to the beginning yeah uh post high school I know you're a student of University of Nairobi so maybe you can tell us about your early days what Drew you to design um and then when you did design What specifically LED you to Interiors because there are various facets of design that you can you can engage in but you settled on the interior aspect so maybe you can walk us through that

2:16 Journey yes I think just something else learned is that you know your your destiny is something you may not see early on yeah uh from when I was very young I was very artistic I liked drawing and um coloring I liked music I liked artart and even in primary school which was quite uncommon I doubled in fashion design so moving into high school the only professions I had heard of that had anything design related apart from graphic design was architecture interior design is wasn't even a word I was familiar with in high school so I did everything I could I did uh technical drawing at Secondary School level I did art at High School level all preparing myself to become this architect uh I thought I was going to be yeah and then when I got to campus I didn't get enough points to get into architecture so end up having to do design yes but between high school and University you

3:17 know those days the break was like 16 months I worked for an Architects firm yes so um I did design in campus um and the design degree as it was that time covered all aspects of of design and art and drawing so it's a bit of a broad um spectrum of artistic uh Pursuits so when I left uh College I got uh a job with a company called communication Graphics that had a graphic design and an interior design Department okay now because of my background having worked for an Architects firm and my ability to do technical drawings that's how I ended up in the interior design Department okay yes by default and and somehow once I started doing interior design I discovered I had come home that found your yes I was always even though I was headed in another Direction I just and I believe that is divine yeah uh I ended up where I I was supposed to be despite

4:14 the fact that it was not as clear at the beginning where you were going you you had seen architecture as the way yes I i' even got a placement at a very prestigious School in London called a School of Architecture yeah but my dad at the very least last minute couldn't afford to send me and he was not a guy of fundraising so yes I had to yeah I had to give up that dream okay yeah no but I think it's worked out pretty well so you you've been in this design space and um you said you started with a with a farm that had a graphic design arm and an interior design arm but you then end up in in in in planning mhm yeah and and planning uh planning systems yeah was an architecture Farm yes so um at how long were you in the first farm and how did you transition now into into planning okay so what happened with communication Graphics uh after a few months the

5:11 principal of that firm uh felt he'd rather focus on interior design so we closed down the graphic design department and I stayed on with the interior design department and I worked there for about 5 years now uh planning systems had set up an interior design department they hired a couple of expatriates from the UK and they were looking for a local designer to complement the team so that's how I got into planning interiors that was in 1992 okay so that time you know the demand for Interior Design Services was growing so we grew from a team of say three people to about seven or eight within the space of about 3 or 4 years yeah in 1995 the uh Partners at planning systems uh decided not to renew the contracts of my expatriate interior design bosses yeah and they promoted me to MD of planning Interiors okay uh and from then on I was running planning Interiors yeah

6:13 now and that brings me to a very interesting facet of your of a career because there's something in in in business school in that we study called management buyouts yes and it's it's uh it's where the um the management team of a of a company buy out that company and turn it into uh an independent company with them as the sh as the shareholders yeah and a lot of times either on the African continent or in Kenya we read about these things theoretically in books you know and we don't have examples but when I met you all those years ago I was pleasantly surprised that you are I think one of um at least for me one of the few people I know in the in the market who have done a management buyout because planning Interiors is now your business and how did that come to pass what happened is around the year 2002 the partners at planning systems uh

7:18 felt they wanted to retire just do projects they were interested in yeah and since planning Interiors even though functionally speaking was just a department within planning systems um we basically were very self-sufficient we had our own set of clientele we had a reputation all our own so they decided uh instead of making a big deal out of it they had tried to give it a valuation before but the interesting thing is cuz planning iners didn't have any assets yes the value was literally the people okay so they said okay fine you guys have helped build this brand with Eugene you at the helm so just take this brand and and run with okay so we we bought it out myself and um one of my fellow directors at the time Fatima yeah almost like for nominal amount of 100 shillings or something like that but the idea being that we take the brand it's now yours yes and

8:15 and create a business out of it so that's where the the rubber really hit the road okay because when I was we were part of planning systems I was just focusing on running the division yes but here as had to start learning about taxes and employees and things like that so I I learned things the hard way now you're entrepreneurial Journey began you know you're a salary collecting MD but now you you became the owner of the business became the owner of the business and when was this around this was in 2003 from January 2003 is when we we were hived off we hived off as a separate company okay yeah so 2003 before we before we get into the intricacies of Entrepreneurship and it challenges yes uh maybe we can speak a bit about interior design yes because I think um uh even for me understanding what interior design is is a factor of my career in Hospitality but prior to

9:16 that you know you hear interior design and you think okay it's it's uh when I build my house I'll call in someone to do interior design but through my relationship with you I've I've gotten to understand a lot more about what interior design and interestingly enough um in episode 6 we had Dr Joyce Gunda of linton's beauty and she spoke quite well about the impact of interior design and how she was pushed to to um on board uh an architect with interior design skills and they designed Linton Pharmacy which was really an iconic location and that formed the foundation of the brand they built M so maybe you can just tell us a bit about what interior design is assuming you're speaking to a Layman who may have had the term but does not quite appreciate what goes into interior design yeah I usually keep it simple cuz I get that question a lot yeah and most

10:20 people are familiar with what an architect does yes so I keep it this simple an architect designs the building we are concerned with what's inside it okay so so that helps uh people understand it a bit better uh most people think when they hear interior design they think oh now you when I get money and get my house yes I I'm going to call you to come and help me select the curtains and what have you now that is actually interior decoration not Interior Design interior design as a profession has evolved into a very technical uh profession especially with the in in corporate settings where the advance of health and saf security data so you find uh sophisticated interior design projects like what has been done locally for Google Microsoft Rockefeller Foundation are very sophisticated products so even though when you think of interior design or where you have people thinking of

11:17 taking their sons and daughters to do interior design abroad MH um it's having a creative artistic ability is a good thing and an interest in all things interior is but the reality of interior design projects is much more about project management team coordination cuz at the end of the day you are delivering a project yes there's there's an interior design component if you look at the look and feel but there's a lot of it that is that is technical our motor planning teers is good design is good for business cuz we've been to our share of of restaurants or hotels where it's evident money has been spent yes but it's been spent very poorly true so so the Gap there was the good design yeah so for us when we design for our clients be it a corporate office be it a hotel be it a restaurant uh not only must uh must it uh look and feel Pleasant and

12:10 inviting but it must also work well you know if it's a restaurant with a kitchen it must be laid out properly uh an interior designer is more often than not um the conductor of an orchestra yes cuz you're dealing with other Consultants maybe there's a Hospitality consultant a kitchen consultant uh also dealing with the contractors the plumber the electrician and what have you so interior design over the years has evolved into a very sophisticated uh profession especially with the larger projects like hotels like you talking about now and I like I like where you have taken this because um some of the conversations we have had that I enjoy is when you understand the power of good design you know uh we've talked with you about a building that um is facing the sun directly and how the the the way the heat uh from the sunlight hits the glass and warmth the building

13:09 affects the running cost because you're running air conditioning system so I think that's what you refer to when you mean the complexity of what goes into it yes and and also with the Advent of ESG and and sustainability people are beginning to take cognizance of some of these things when they're being designed yes there's a return to um and Al also it was precipitated by covid a preference for setting up a building where the ventilation is natural yes where um resources natural resources are recycled and things like that so you have certifications like Edge Le and more and more corporates are embracing some of those practices so that when the when the establishment is done be it a hotel be it an office not only does it look good um but the materials are durable the sources of wood are sustainable yes so this whole thing of responsible um development um you know precipitated by the need to conserve the

14:07 environment is is basically also Pro producing a value proposition that is medium to long term so it's not just about us designing a nice space finishing it up handing you over the key but in 3 to 5 years you know is it going to be energy efficient are the materials going to be durable are the economics done well is access Universal for all all sorts of people so so what is happening is it's it's evolving to be more of a um I don't know whe to call it um it's human centered design yes that's where I think of it okay so so from when someone enters a space what they see what they feel what they smell what they interact with the heights at which they sit the quality of the seat everything must contribute to health and well-being of people and what we're seeing that is becoming increasingly important across the board yeah whether it's an office a hotel a restaurant uh even when it comes

15:04 to healthc care now we were involved in um the interior design for choman medical um Center yes and you see now with the Advent of mental health it's becoming increasingly important um to look at even the paint colors you paint a room is that going to lift the mood of a depressed person for examp if the materials are they easy to clean are you able to maintain uh disinfectant quality the um cleanliness in some of these spaces so what we're finding is that you know interior design it's almost like the aesthetic component is becoming a smaller and smaller part of the total delivery of the project so have you found that uh because you what when you when you sit down and explain it it's very clear on why your services are are needed right but H in a market that knows for example architect you know basic the architect builds you know and

16:01 like you say uh there's uh misrepresentation people think interior design is interior decoration you know so I'll call someone pick curtains and carpets and and we're fine but design is a lot more than that so the struggle have you found yourself of having to play both as you're an entrepreneur in design you're also having to be a bit of a teacher is that is that a fair comment absolutely I all along from when I started in this profession in the late 80s uh because in the first decade of my work in this profession most of the Interior Design was being done by Architects cuz people did not have put a name to the professional they need to deal with the Interiors uh those days for example um there were just one or two firms that specialized in hospitality and they did the architecture and interior design even the interior design was being done by

16:56 Architects okay so for us this is a profession that has evolved over the last few decades um I think also people have traveled more gone and seen nice spaces and come back and discover you know if you if you want your restaurant done up really nicely the person look for actually is an interior designer not an architect so so awareness of this profession has grown over the years but even now in this day and age we still have to educate people and differentiate ourselves from interior decorators um their Lanes we are more commercial interior designers um so the education process continues uh what has also helped raise the standards and awareness is also it's a bit of a double-edged sword for us business-wise is a lot of the more sophisticated projects especially the hotel chains um the design is done by international interior designers but

17:52 they bring a new standard as well that local uh businesses are rising to okay which is an encouraging thing to see yeah uh so fewer and fewer people are going straight to contractors and more and more people are realizing if my product is going to be viable as a business if it's an office and I want to attract the best and the brightest I am going to have to get a designer to to do it so so like the value ad Dr Gunda was talking about yes uh is something more and more people are becoming awareness aware of and also with the Advent of Technology now access to certain um websites like Pinterest and others where there's almost like an increase in the use of DIY tools yes so people have more access to good design online so they have an appreciation of what they would like to see yeah but also realizing that they they may not be the experts maybe

18:47 they do one project and it goes horribly wrong uh like when we did uh Java we worked with Java for about six or seven years they did the first five branches themselves and they did a reasonably good job themselves but when they got to project number six and they were growing the business they said okay now it's time for us to work with experts you know to help build and consolidate this um uh brand so that that was an interesting experience for our sales as well you you you sound like you're the ultimate ER you're in the space where if I dare say um the the Monica cheap is expensive applies to your your industry very well in the sense that you may think that you're saving money by not using this service but the reality is you could make a lot more money and probably even save more in the long term because when I when I think about uh

19:43 kitchen design which like you said kitchen designers um a well-designed kitchen could be the difference between a staffing of two people versus five or six mhm yeah and so H because uh salaries are a recurring cost in any business you know when you do have a well-designed kitchen you can run it excellently with two people versus a poorly designed kitchen which the investor may not know he poorly designed yes you know because he's bought expensive equipment but he's wondering why isn't my restaurant making money and it's because of the running CES so you do you do sit squarely in that space where yes people may scratch their heads at the fees that you're charging but the value your value is is longer term that that would be I think no no no it is and part of the education is helping people appreciate the business value of spending that little bit extra on a good

20:42 designer I think it's also because this industry here is relatively young it's not like in the west where interior design is such an established profession yeah people know not to do certain projects without the the right professionals on board M here you know we we are also evolving from uh a culture where like in the '90s for example there was also a lot of corruption in the construction industry so you would find that the criteria for getting a plum job we we we got uh lost a lot of work because we were not willing to compromise on our standards or you know so what I think happened in the 2000s is people started doing business correctly then that's when now things started improving for us because people started looking for the best profession as opposed to the cheapest professional especially in corporate settings the other thing we found as well as as

21:36 corporate governance levels continue to rise that also helps mitigate cronyism and and uh nepotis and more and more organizations are going through elaborate processes to get the best consultant I was even contacted the other day by a company that wants to hire uh designers to do retail design for a chain of pharmaceutical um um Outlets you know maybe they listen to G's interview okay and and I was called they they wanted to consult and hire me to help them evaluate the designers they they were using and when I sent them a bit of a write up in terms of what advice I could give them to help guide the the the process I realized all these years I've done pitching and what I actually have a lot to bring to the table when it comes to helping and guiding other designer but for me that was a first you know I was called up oh yes you know we've heard about you youve

22:33 experienced in the industry you're probably better place to help us pick the right designer than we are so to me that is that is progress oh wow that is because there's an appreciation now of the skill set and the value of the knowledge yes yes yes there is because you see now um a lot of designers are coming onto the market and it's getting harder and harder for people to really tell who's a good designer and who's not every one can do a fascinating Pinterest page everyone can use AI generated tools to do really impressive three-dimensional you know images but you know at the end of the day it's about delivering the Project true that's where the differentiation comes so what people are beginning to realize is is there seems to be even when we look at the evaluation process when we're pitching for work the amount of information we're required to provide

23:24 now Visa say 20 years ago where we just sent a two-page Fe proposal take it or leave it tells you about how much more seriously this is being taken now getting the right profession so I think there's been a lot of progress uh there's been a lot of progress in that front yeah so you you mentioned Java earlier on and um one of the things that I find with your pro profession is um one of the challenges of selling your services yeah is you are invisible yeah to the end consumer in the sense that people go to Java every day yeah but there's no immediate unless they get to meet you talk to you or know someone who knows you don't know that this iconic restaurant brand in the Kenyan Market that transformed the way we consume coffee you were involved in in the early stage in in bringing some formality because um you said you started working with them at Branch six that was very

24:28 early in the game but that not withstanding even the I know you do a lot of commercial and Executive offices very few people get to know that this lovely office for Bank X or Bank Y is your work so how do you overcome that because uh you are one you have acknowledged that you're teaching the market about the value of design uh but you you can't force the customer or the client to say make sure you say that you know I designed this office so how how do you go around selling a business of that nature yeah and it's it's been a challenge for me because you know that's a business aspect I have been I must confess I've not been as good at yes cuz now the game is also a lot more about how you Market yourself than before yes so um there is the traditional mode of networking playing golf and things like that but what's becoming increasingly important is social media presence you

25:29 write articles on LinkedIn your Instagram pages and things like that to create awareness so that is something we have had to um in our business development department strengthen our capacity uh to do yes because I I find also um for me even today after all these years of running a business I'm still a designer at heart yes I'm still an introvert at heart so a lot of these hobnob being Market do not come naturally to me at all Ian you know you've known me for many years and and I always you know shy shy behind it but I I believe that this is more of a business Challenge and and to rise to it you have to um look at what the market needs they sensitive to what is required I mean I read books I speak to other marketers I speak to people like yourself yeah uh in order to get a feel for what can be done moving into the future yeah so even with my business now

26:25 I am trying to um work myself out of a job very seriously because my role needs to move more towards mentoring providing guidance and support and for p to survive into the future I'm very determined that the business does not end with me yes because a lot of Consultants Architects qss uh they run their businesses the businesses have made money for them but they they've not grown it Beyond themselves and a few employees I really feel that p as a brand has outgrown me and I need to do what is required to build it Beyond uh me so I'm spending a lot of time focusing on what the future looks like and and where P fits in and and trying to to build a team that is able to take p uh into the future and those are some of the lessons I've learned uh you you know there's a certain set of business skills you require design technical skills is one thing but that's just not enough to run

27:25 um p as a business you need Good Financial skills good it skills good um marketing skills project management yeah project management is Central and key I think also in the Consulting uh space uh people are moving more towards strategic Partnerships than building the firm organically okay cuz as a time in 2014 we had grown to about 38 staff now we are less than um half that okay and no matter how success we get in terms of getting projects I've realized that uh it's better to remain lean yes uh because that is the way of the future actually with the Advent of the internet international access you can work just as easily with a designer from South Africa you can get someone from India to do the technical drawings you can subcontract the project management uh because as the projects become more sophisticated um it's interesting with competition it's quite ironic that the

28:26 average project we run today we ear 30 to 40% less in fees than we did 10 years ago oh wow yes the fees so so Consulting on its own yes is becoming it's not cannot be yes it become less and less sustainable as the years go by yes so so you have to evolve your model yes you have to evolve your model okay and and people have more choices now you know if you have a sophisticated Hotel you are not limited to local designers everyone is just a phone call or an email away if you want a from Brazil maybe you've seen and liked the designers work on on Instagram or whatever yeah yeah and anyone can do work anywhere yeah but Eugene and there are case for local context in the sense that um you and I were talking the other day about a hotel yeah and uh one of the new hotels that has opened up in naobi and when you walk into the lobby it has a quote unquote

29:27 African thing but the designer in you you you immediately commented that it's it's clearly not done by an African or anyone who has a passion for Africa and that that that I think is where I lean more towards yes we can Source the services from anywhere but there important for local context because it's a it's a it's a k it's it's a hotel in the heart of H East Africa a lot of West African art has been used but clearly the person who used the African mask to do the the interior decoration yeah did not bother to H do the groundwork or put in the effort so I think there's a case for uh uh local context yeah no absolutely I mean we there there at least three or four projects we've done in the last three or four years yeah where um there's an international designer and they have engaged us just to handle that segment of it m so we have a department that does signage branding artworks and

30:34 accessories yes uh run by a very experienced artist who's been with us for 10 or 15 years and we're able to provide a service if you have an office if you have a hotel we can sit down with you and you say okay fine you want young and upcoming artists we're in touch with all the local galleries we have relationships with some of these collectives so we can put something that is genuinely Kenyan in terms of artworks and accessories yes and we're finding for us it's just for us to Market that special ability nice so what we're finding is also the the scope of services we provide like now we've done work for a couple of corporates where an international designer has been engaged to do the offices for this corporate in a number of countries yes so we come in and they say look you know uh we can do the design from our office in London but we need someone on the ground with

31:26 experience dealing with the local contractors and whatever you uh to be able to implement it so that's another thing we've started so some of our clients now are international designers and architects who are looking who have been appointed to do projects in the region and looking at having a partner on the ground to to do it so it's interesting for us also we need to present ourselves as people they can trust with our design because you know some of them are wary you know these guys will go and start marketing this work as their own and things like that so the other thing one of our one of our core values is integrity so we believe that if you're engaging us to represent you here you you can trust us to give you credit where it's due you can trust us to ensure that whatever you've designed is executed to the standard you require so what we're finding is that as

32:17 we sit and brainstorm it's almost like there new specialist offerings yes that we can bring to the table so it's almost like and if you can't beat it them join them interior international interior designers are here to stay international hotel chains as you know agreed yeah they have their own designers yes and and they business reasons for doing it that way okay so we've just found a way to work with them instead of fighting against them so two things I'd like us to touch on one based on what you just speaking about your relationship with International designers you think you you have then played a role yeah MH in debunking my myid and changing Minds about the caliber of talent and expertise that exists on the African continent uh yes we have in our own small ways I mean there are two large corporates we did work for in the last three or four years where for them

33:13 International corporates for them as a policy yes is when they go into a country policy-wise they look for the local talent okay only revert to the international designers if they don't find somebody suitable and in those two or three cases say we did work for international corporates that would ordinarily have done the work with with reputable International designers yeah and that has been good for our portfolio it has also helped Benchmark yes um um and we say we've done work for this organization that organization uh because we also have local organizations seeking to you know up their game when it comes to interiors and things like that because even in Kenya we have large corporates that are expanding into the region true so finding that they want to work with Partners who are able to um do work globally okay so local context but there's a global approach even right now

34:07 we're doing work for a panafrican bank yes and and in the in the pitch process we we actually beat out a firm from South Africa and a firm from UK because they said we want to work ideally with a firm that has African Roots understands African uh culture and service yes and is able to do it so for them it's a corporate policy there have okay to promote Africa even when it comes to uh working with the Consultants as it were so some of those have helped support us when it comes to so as you speak I as you speak uh uh and and just connecting the dots to we mentioned Dr Joyce Gunda earlier in linton's Beauty World yes as you speak I I can't help but connect the dots to the future of um Enterprise like yours yeah being related to or becoming more robust with the growth of African Brands you know the more we we aspire to build local brands with strong local

35:09 context but executed to an international standard uh the more I see roles for your your Farms like yourself and any other Farms that are related to that uh interior design space or even the architecture space um kind of um when we build Our Brands you know if we have like you you mentioned Banks so local banks go becoming Regional Banks then they take that service there so do you see yourself related to the growth of local Brands yes yes and we we've been involved in it in fact uh what we find with some of the potential clients we've been talking to they're very interested in in looking at some of the clients with whom we've gone the journey with okay you know we've had some clients we've been with for over 20 years yes that now Regional power houses and started small so we're saying you know what we're saying is we can come alongside you as business partners on

36:04 your journey if you Embrace The Motto that good design is good for business and your your business has a retail component there are various aspects of human interaction that interior design can help enhance and strengthen your brand CU brand you know as you know has become increasingly important and will continue to grow to be so so for us we also brand implementation Specialists as well yeah so so you know we work with branding agencies a lot on projects so so we come in as almost like a crucial Cog in in the development in the expansion in the entrenchment of of a brand in in the region so we'll encourage our listeners who are out there if you see maybe a local or International brand that wants to leave the country and you have the capability to acquire them or or to participate in the acquisition so that you can build or spin off a local brand out of that I

37:05 think that's something that would lend itself very well to to work that you do yeah absolutely and I think one of the things I'm also looking at now is cor curating um case studies of of clients we've worked with over a number of years seen how they've grown and it's quite evident the impact good designers had on their business you know if it's a bank we're talking about branches if it's a restaurant we're talking about Outlets so we've been part of those Journeys yes and when we're looking at how to reposition ourselves into the future we're coming in and saying look let's take a more businesslike business growth approach okay uh and here we are the right people to partner with because the challenge you're also having now there are lots of new firms coming up but it's you'll be hard pressed to get a firm that has the length and breadth of experience we have you do so the

37:55 challenge for us now moving into the future is how to pack package this um experience expertise and and knowledge of the local and regional market to provide um a unique value proposition to a new set of clients who are looking to grow and expand into into the region yeah yeah now let's let's go back into um we started this conversation by speaking about how you transitioned uh from an employee uh into a business owner yeah but you're in a unique space in the sense that you you sell knowledge like like the owners of or the partners at planning systems told you when you wanted to acquire their business they said listen um the talent is the people yeah um and uh you've walked this journey uh for over 20 years now with planning Interiors um let's speak a bit about a topic that we talk about a lot with you which is capitalization yeah of of businesses that don't really acquire

39:01 assets you know so you you are dealing in Talent you your core value is your ability to develop Talent retain it yeah um and and and then use that Talent effectively to execute the projects that you get so how on the funding side of that because you're not getting money to buy an office you know you're getting money so that you can sustainably pay your Sal and your other operating expenses to execute the projects and I know that's been quite a journey yeah and it continues to be a challenge because the disconnect is basically we we execute projects and payment is Milestone based yes but your your cash flow systems are monthly because you have rent and salaries to pay monthly so it's always a juggling act a difficult juggling act and and what we're finding is that we need to restructure the way uh we are pay to enable us to manage those overheads cuz you see for banks

40:01 here they're always looking for collateral but since you are a consulting firm you really don't have collateral to speak of and sometimes you just want money to pay you've got a project that's running four or five months maybe it's a client who hasn't even set up their systems in the country so they they've signed a contract with you maybe they've agreed to pay a premium because you they're not paying in advance so you'd expect to be able to go with this contract with a reputable organization to the bank and say look I'm almost guaranteed the payment here can I have a temporary facility at least to cover my costs as I do it yes you you will you'll be amazed at how difficult to Impossible and this is when you're working for clients and and Banks you know who you're doing the work for and you're saying look we're working for you we we have a contract with you the and we

40:56 signed your contract with s plates we can only get paid once a budget is established and is approved so we're doing a whole lot of work before yeah before you know surely you you can come and say look you yourselves can guarantee this because the work is being done for you and and there's no space for that they say look I'm sorry so would you say from your experience over 20 years that there's a scope for the Kenyan Financial Services sector absolutely to deeper understand yes businesses that are structured around intellectual Talent like your own yes so that they can develop tools that serve you better in terms of financing your operations yes because you are I mean the fact that you've been in business for 20 odd years speaks to the value that you owe for the market and the brands that you mentioned but do you feel that there's either not a reluctance but an ignorance and a

41:51 failure to understand the way your businesses run to be able to offer you Financial products that would be beneficial to you yeah I think especially the larger corporate banking entities it's it's almost like a problem they don't want to bother with and and I think of this as such a double standard because with the recent years there's been the Advent of the relationship manager yes who when you cuz like us we do work for banks and with a lot of these Banks whenever you're doing work for them they require you to open an account now because they're interested in retaining you as a customer so you don't just open the account when you're doing the work and you close it after so they come and say a relationship manager who can even come to your office and talk to you nicely and say we're your business partner but to me I've always found that as lip service because when

42:35 push comes to shove the yes and you you you you need to pay salaries and for some reason or other the project Milestone has been delayed and a lot of times it's at the Beast of the client they're not they're not willing to listen so it's it's something I've scratched my head but it's also been a major inhibitor in the growth of consulting firms because because of that challenge and that uh constraint I think many are younger Consulting from in the market will be surprised to hear you speak of challenges which they may feel are exclusive to them you know you in your earlier days you probably feel that this is going to be you know this is year one to five I'm a young Farm but now to hear you talk about experiencing those challenges today yes speaks to I think the magnitude of the opportunity I think a mind sh a mind shift is required in the financial services in the market

43:33 to recognize that how do we deal with business and learn how do we deal with business where the talent is the people yes yes absolutely absolutely because the talent is not a thing you're not going to buy a 2ac plot in runda and use it as security yeah your talent is your people and you have to continue attracting the best yes retaining them retaining yeah cuz if you pay late for two or three months in a row people get saying thing is it falling with me inside and it's not enough to say look you know we have these performer invoices you guys work to get paid at the end of the day you know for your staff it's not their problem agreed they know they've come to work they've worked done an h a state work they should get paid all that is all those are management uh problems cuz so those are some of the things we're also reviewing as we review our our payment systems and and why um that

44:32 business remodeling is required because even with the Advent of competition a lot of people are working from their homes you know many many like like like for us it's it's a bit odd that some of the large projects the clients are very fussy about capacity yes so you need a certain capacity to be eligible for some large corporates CU they've discovered okay you can get someone working from home with appropriate qualifications by the end of the day this is a project of a certain size and scale and scale and and financial investment on the part of the corporate so you can't take you know with these individuals so us we're remodeling it and saying you know now that needs to be costed into the project yes and and it's so interesting culturally MH if it's if you have a contractor or you're getting something fabricated yeah people don't have problem paying 50% deposit yes but as a

45:23 designer you go and tell a client you want 50% up front you'll be press to get a single person to agree and and the principle is the same you're still investing time and resources yeah so no one has a problem with a fundi coming and saying look please pay me 50% cuz I need to buy wood I need to buy yes we're saying please pay us the deposit because we need to pay of course the people have started thinking your project through already yeah yes yeah so so that perception I think for us uh because now the architectural Association has set up an interior design chapter we have an interior design associ as well those are some of the things at the association level need to start being dealt and grappled with and start coming in with the requirements that even when you're pitching for work cuz you put in a lot of work in order to achieve that job

46:11 that that is work that should legitimately be paid for by by the C and hopefully conversations like the one that we having hopefully there are some local or Regional Bankers listening and and do acknowledge that this is a space and an opportunity because because I believe I believe it is you know as our hospitality industry grows our retail sector grows our uh commercial sectors continue to grow our companies Kenyan companies evolve from local to Regional you know um these services will be required and that they will evolve into more and better so I think there's an opportunity there for any Bank out there yeah to to Think Through products that that genuinely not lip service wise because I think the lip service story in a Kenyan context is a big challenge that genuinely serve uh businesses like like yours and and we can continue to see them Thrive because um if we could

47:14 transition from uh thriving in spite of and start thriving because of then we we will really unlock the true potential that I think we have and we and and now we can also be contributors to the success stories Bankers site yes you know they talk about having supported the industry and what have you agreed but maybe they look at it and say you know the creative uh Consulting industry is too small but the government and certain public uh you know NGO organizations are beginning to appreciate the relevance of the creative economy yes so what's also uh being looked at now is how do we grow these cottage industries because a lot of these creative um be it um a dress maker fashion designer someone who makes baskets and what have you there's a there's a huge opportunity here to bring together designers and crafts people to start evolving new

48:12 products but some of the biggest challenges you find is that a lot of these people don't have business skills so they may have one batch done and they sent out but they don't know how to build and grow Banks also need to be sensitive to the need to look at certain some of these business models and say how can we provide financing and support to get some of these good ideas off the ground and have a situation where in four or five time years this is a thriving cottage industry that is exporting uh its product and what have you cuz I found South Africa through their design in Institute have something like that okay here we have the makings of some but again you know here the challenge we have is is lip service okay so for me even as I try to transition into my next phase of life I really want to be come a voice where I can speak to

49:02 something like that the the creative economy saying that we are a viable and tangible contributor to the future of Kenya's economy because even when we look at the unemployment problem with uh with the young people I'm involved with an art gallery in um called Ary Gallery just near stratmore yes and the propriety of the art gallery really has a focus on supporting upand cominging artists yes and when I go there it's incredible just to see how much creative Talent there is amongst the genes and um and younger Millennials you know and saying you know is there an opportunity to take all this talent and start to package it in such a way that people can start creating livelihoods and and cottage businesses yeah uh and put Kenya on the map as far as the creative economy is concerned I know there's a lot being spoken about the creative economy at a high level at the Master Card Foundation level one or two

49:57 organizations that specialize in providing funding to creative Cottage businesses but a lot more needs to be done because for us we've been employers for many years yes so many of the designers in the industry have gone through planning being trained so we've contributed to the current standard you're seeing here yes but here if after all these years we're still struggling to remain afloat yes then uh you know something is something is a miss so you have brought in government and yeah do you do you feel that it would be beneficial yeah Kenya is a a colonial project that got independence yeah do you think it would be beneficial for the Kenya government yeah to have an overarching design standard or is that a conversation that you think would be worthy of having such that um when we go into public buildings there's a certain uh theme or uniformity or feel look and

50:58 feel and and thus government is the biggest consumer uh in any market in terms of what they procure yeah but imagine if huduma centers and the lobby where we go and collect our passports you know wasn't just a DBL place but had some design because like you like rightly say design does h a influence you know it comes or it inspires or do you think that's a conversation that's worthy of having no AB absolutely and and um the interior design chapters and um idak that's interor design asso of Kenya I I believe they are the Forefront of of pushing that conversation yeah the government the ministry of works for decades just employed Architects they've started employing interior designers as well so we have interior designers now working in government Ministries which means that recognition is beginning to happen starting to happen so there's a sense in

51:56 which we we are are a bit late to the table but I think it's better late than never yes and that is going to start to happen cuz for the government they're also realizing that you know they have all this office space that needs to start being used more efficiently this business of enclosed offices like if you go to a government office you know that thing of there's a corridor and there all these doors you know more and more government departments are realizing we have to go open plan we have to have meeting RS we have to change the way we work to meet the future and realizing that the people best equipped to design these spaces interior designers so so there is there is uh some progress I'm happy to report nice the government is also at the Forefront of supporting ESG and sustainability efforts and they need to be able to set the example as well

52:46 with their own spaces okay so in my conversations with a couple of interior designers who've been employed by government is apparently that's at the Forefront of what they've been charged to do they're getting trained in in sustainability design and things like that and I think working with a Green Building Society as well they're also very active in working with government and government bodies that also helps uh Propel the industry interior design industry and its relevance to the broader Community forward so Eugene you you've had a full spectrum career and you're in a reflective phase yes yeah you can say that what what do you what excites you about what's happening on the African continent in yourf specific space but also generally because you you are dealing with corporates who are going regional you're dealing with companies that were Nairobi based mainly and have moved to multiple towns and

53:37 continue to grow and hopefully grow so what excites you about where we're headed H when looked at in the context of where we are coming from um I think when it looks at the way design is going I think the the Advent of the internet and globalization it it's a bit of a double-edge SWAT in from the sense that design has become interior design has become more universally standard uh there's a sense in which um the more mundanely similar Interiors are becoming the more desire there is to do something unique and different and Africa you know has still has a lot of culture and art and color that they can contribute to the quality of interior spaces so I believe that moving into the future we people are going to look people desire unique spaces yes you know when you look at a lot of the contemporary furniture now there's nothing differentiating about it you know if it's a sit to stand desk the

54:38 mechanism is the same but maybe what can differentiate it is um maybe the the wood top yes could have been you know manufactured using a sustainable wood so even with the Advent of personal personalization you see that in fashion you see that interior Decor uh again accelerated by Co it the need to introduce more homely features into working spaces so it's like it's everything is being melded into lifestyle as it were so so with that comes a desire for Unique eclectic things and Africa has a lot to offer on that on that front so there's an inter project we're doing that is going to run across seven or eight African countries East Africa West Africa and what we're really excited about is incorporating local um creative artistic components into each excellent so the way we're designing the retail outlets for that organization is that 70 to 80% of it is

55:33 going to be standard but 20% especially the aesthetic component is going to be local specific which is incredible um um big component yes it's a big component and helps sustain and preserve our cultures into the future because you've seen some countries in West Africa they pushing to have certain valuable artifacts repatriated from the US and the UK so also with our youth now uh that are more familiar with Western you know uh culture need to be reminded uh of what their past is and interior environments are going to become a key component as you're speaking I'm connecting some dots to um in our third episode we had Leonard mucho who we both know sa and one of the topics that we discussed which I found very interesting was how he used his architectural skills to bring dignity into living spaces for young Africans so as you are speaking that

56:32 same thought about dignity through design is coming through in terms of um that if you do see yourself culturally in a space from a design perspective it does contribute to the dignity and the general good feeling about yourself for Africans and I think that's something quite Noble to Aspire to no no absolutely when we look at the generations now we are designing and Catering for into the future it's very different from us you know as we grew up we educated in very conformist fashion yes you know the schools we went to the churches we went to but now you're finding the younger Generations are more will question things they won't take things at face value yes they have individual tastes and needs so they want more variety to choose from you know ask we may do with very little so so in in resp respon to that I think there's a sense in which um individual uniqueness

57:31 of product um depth of product people are more interested in where this wood was made if it's a fabric print which country is it from is it representative of a certain cultural artifact or picture so so that um aspect of sophistication if you will that was thought to be The Preserve of the West CU we've always thought that these touristy things are the reserve of visitors from abroad now you find Outlets here locally are patronized just as much by the local um corporates and as it is uh by by the Internationals and I think that's incredible progress and very good for the interior designers as a as a profession euga fabulous fabulous conversation I think um as I reflect on what we've just discussed over the last hour it it speaks to my Um passion for design and thank you very very much for being a guest on our podcast and for enlightening us on the potential design

58:34 has for Africa and Africans on the continent M yes and if you have any parting words now you can share them with us before we bid farewell to our audience yeah I think like I said I turned 60 a couple of days ago and I and uh something my wife said at my birthday said she prayed for me and said May the coming decade be an year of impact for you wow so for me it's to take the 30 years um I've been in this industry and what I've learned and say how do I turn this around and give back to to to the generations that are coming up so even though we look at the problems and challenges we have uh as a country this is also a country that is full of opportunity and talent and intelligence and I think sometimes uh it takes going to other countries in Africa that are not as developed as are to appreciate that us even with all our problems if we just sort ourselves out

59:31 we can really create a future for the generations that come behind us and I think for me the most important component of this impact strategy I have is to play a small part in strengthening and giving hope to that to those future Generations using design very well said yeah ladies and gentlemen thank you very much for joining us as we record recorded episode 8 of African new podcast a fabulous discussion with Eugene Andi of planning interiors and we look forward to having you in the future please do subscribe to our Channel on YouTube and Spotify thank you very much