Harriet Chebet — transcript

Harriet's Botanicals

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.

0:01 [Music] Greetings ladies and gentlemen and welcome to episode 26 of the African Do podcast. Today we're very privileged to have with us uh Harriet Chibet Gawk. Harriet runs a very interesting business that takes uh African indigenous medicines and supplements and packages them in a modern context. They run this booth as a manufacturing entity and a retail entity and we are looking forward to hearing more about this business. Harriet, welcome to the
Thank you so much for having me, Leonard.
Excellent. So, Harriet, let's get straight into it. Um, before we get into the details of the business. Yeah. Maybe let's talk a bit about your background. Yeah.
Uh, so where does Harriet come from uh to this point where you find yourself entrepreneuring in this way with this business?

0:55
Okay. So I mean I'm I would like to say I'm just like a regular uh Kenyan woman.
Yes.
Um you know I was born in Nairobi actually
and um my my formative years were in Nairobi. I went to school here all the way up until university.
Okay.
And then I went to England. I went to London actually.
Yes.
And pretty much I was your typical stious kind of person. I always liked new things but I never really thought I'd ever be in a business like this. M
my background is in law and finance.
Okay.
My first degree is LL LLB
mercantile law. My second degree is international banking and finance law.
Okay.
So what I really wanted to be was an investment banker. Okay.
I wanted to go to Wall Street. So those were my ideas when I was at university

1:42
and I ended up at JP Morgan Chase and Goldman Sachs. Yes.
And also the financial services authority in the UK.
Okay. So this was not really my idea like I didn't I didn't want to be an entrepreneur from the beginning.
I thought I was just going to be a professional.
Yes.
And a banker at that.
Yes.
So this is a business I stumbled onto.
Okay.
Um what had been going on with me from when I was age 16 was very painful menes.
The kind that you faint and taken to the sanatorium.
Yes. So as I started working now, this became a big problem because I'd bleed for even a week or even 10 days and I'm in a lot of pain.
So it started to interfere with my work and I started to look for alternative remedies when I was in living in England

2:27
and that is a society that has everything from you know the natural remedies to the alternative remedies to even you know go going as far as the mystical remedies
to the alopathic remedies. Yes. So since my bank was paying for my healthare, I had access to doctors who could not help me. I had access to good healthare actually which I wasn't even paying for.
So I started looking at things like essential oils, uh herbs, um flower essences and I learned how to make them at home. Okay.
So I'd go to all these festivals. The UK has a lot of these kind of natural festivals or summer festivals
and I started learning a lot about the industry.
Yes. without knowing that it was going to take me anywhere.

3:10
Okay.
Now, I moved back home um mainly because my parents were getting older and I I thought it was time for me to spend more time with them,
but I still came back home with this problem.
So then again um we had a lady who worked for us and she brought me these herbs from a place called Web Buuya. We used to call them Wuya.
Yes. and they had aloe vera and she had an uncle who was a herbalist go into Kakamega forest and send these and I got some relief maybe 5%.
Yes,
I had another neighbor from Ko Marakquet who also had the same problem with her daughters.
So in my time it was common to have painful periods.
We thought it was normal you take a painkiller.
Some of us were taking you know very heavy drugs strong prescription painkillers

3:56
not knowing that we're not supposed to.
Yes. 2017 now my dad's funeral and I was bleeding heavily in a lot of pain
and this woman approached me just from the way I was walking and said
tomorrow I'll bring you da
and I was amused but it was not
this was actually in sautik in bomet county
yes
so I was amused
and I thought okay well I could try anything I love mixing these things around
and after I used that group of um whether it's bark So she brought she brought the next day she brought it.
Yes. She brought like this thing. She had covered it in like a newspaper.
It was like barks. It was roots. It was leaves. It was twigs. And I was like, "Hey, this looks interesting." I brought it back to Nairobi

4:42
and for the first time I had a painless period in my life.
Really?
And that was like for the first time in like 20 years.
Mhm.
So I was like, "Wow." So I gave it to a friend
who was on her way to a hyctomy.
Yes. And she had been bleeding for 21 days and it was coming out like porridge.
Yes.
So I thought before you go for the hyerectomy, use this to manage your pain
or whatever it is you're going through.
And then that was it. She never went for the hyctomy.
She and and and whatever it was
it was completely resolved.
Wow.
Because I went back she told me when you go back bring more of that stuff. Huh. And then now she shared this information in a WhatsApp group and the rest is history.

5:27
So that's that's very interesting. So you you accidentally and it's it's interesting that you are
let's say you you're you're a you're a citizen of the globe. You know you are educated in Nairobi. You are fortunate enough to study out of the country. Yes.
And I'm sure your work took you all across Europe in in in your work. And so you have this exposure.
Yes. And that exposure has come with you trying like you said you had good healthare good so you tried everything both local and international
and you now come and discover a solution accidentally. Yes.
Yeah. In a traditional African
um um that in itself if the story ended there it would have been very interesting.
Yeah.

6:13
But how do you then get inspired to turn this into a business? I I mean I can't say I was inspired even at the time when we're in the WhatsApp group and they started calling me Tishamares
and you know they were like hey what's Harriet up to you know
you know Squeezy she's looking different she's I was losing weight
you know I was like beginning to look younger and the one she tell let her tell you what she's what she got from up country right
at the time I was still doing my finance consulting
I was working in renewable energy water and affordable housing I was raising finance
okay
and I was working with an EU new um company. They were the ones who actually coming up with the funders.

6:52
Yes.
So, and I was doing some work at some point with DEFID, at some point with CEDA.
So, I was just doing my work, but under pressure now to start boiling this this thing
to start telling people, oh yeah, go and talk to so and so, bring me more of that stuff.
And they'd bring it. And I'd boil it. Let's say I'd boil three bottles. I used to go to the neighbors and borrow a Coke bottle. Tell them, "Do you have old plastic bottles? I can recycle them." Yeah.
Yeah.
And it just now the pressure. So I started now I'm still doing my finance consulting.
So then I started maybe making 10 bottles on one jo
just in the house.
Yes.
I I a big Sufura.
I bottle them.
Again I give to friends. I was still giving.

7:36
Then someone suggested you can sell this thing and make some money on the side. I started selling at 800 shillings. I bought them.
Yeah. Then what what happened is now um I kept getting so many questions even from that same WhatsApp group.
Yes.
Uh my classmates from high school.
Okay.
There were so many questions. How does it work? What is the dosage? What's in it? You know, where did you find it? You know, because people were getting like
if you give someone who's had painful menes and then they experience a painless period. Now the questions come,
they're like, I have a sister, I have a cousin, I have a daughter, my auntie, so many. So I made a video because I was tired of answering questions. Not because I was growing my business,

8:16
right? I said this business this every time somebody asks me
I'm going to put this on.
I'm going to just put here I check this video.
So I made a video and then I put the video on Facebook and literally up until now that video got up to 4 million views.
Wow.
And again my life went crazy
because now people started insulting me on the video. Where are you? How can you put this? What's your number? You don't respond. you don't respond. Now, it became a mission responding to this video.
Yes.
And that's when I spoke to a friend and said, "Hey, I need some help. You respond, I'll be making this da. I'll take it to G4s Karen at that time and then G4S will dispatch it."
So, I kind of had like a PA, but she was a friend at the time.

9:04
So, now it just kind of got crazy. It went from the 10 bottles on one go to now we got the big charcoal go 10 GO
10 bottles each
so we're now standardizing naturally now we're doing a 100 bottles a day and then we have a rider
then another friend came and said to me I'll help you with that business of yours there's actually in town a shelf called notify
you pay 4,000 shillings because on that thread people are really complaining it's expensive to get this product of yours Right. I say, "Okay, we'll put it on the shelf and we'll say you guys go to notify where now you can that's a pickup point and then you coordinate with my PA, so to speak." Yeah. Now, what happened in that shop is like I completely my clients overwhelmed and overrun the shop.

9:52
Wow.
There were just so many. They were only selling
and my one product, the one for women
was moving off the shelf.
So then we got into a disagreement with the owner because I was literally taking over.
Yes.
Right. So, one person who was working there said to me, "Across the road there's a new mall." Well, that's our mall. We'll get you a shop in there.
So, that was my first shop.
And I moved with three people plus the rider.
Yeah. I'm still doing finance consulting. For me, this is just like my side hustle, right?
Yeah.
But it's it's getting complicated. We're printing labels. We went to Safe Park. We got bottles. It's like this this thing is just moving, moving, moving.

10:31
Very organic.
Very organic. Then to advertise widely, even the fact that I'd put that video on Facebook. Yes. I created a page, Harriet's Botanicals. I found a picture of me. I thought, "This is nice." I put my picture there.
Then I was told by somebody who was working at KIPI. He said to me, "You need to get the the licenses for traditional medicine."
Yes.
And that I said, "How?"
Then they knew somebody who was at uh University of Nairobi pharmacology and pharmaccognosy department.
Yes.
So what then happened is the school I went to um for high school alliance M
the person working at Kippy was the MD at the time
and he had a cousin who was actually with me 3 years behind me

11:11
and she was a pharmacist.
Yes.
She was um head of pharmacy and the pharmaceutical and far pharmacology and pharmaccognosy department.
So when I went there now I met her
to Nairobi University.
Yes. University of Nairobi. So she took me to the same department and told me oh yeah bring them. We're going to test them.
Yes.
Bring your set of herbs. Mhm.
So I took them there and they tested and they gave me a report and they sent me to the uh Ministry of Culture because traditional medicine sits under Ministry of Culture, not Ministry of Health.
Interesting.
And they took that report which said these are common herbs used everywhere.
That was what the report said.

11:48
And then they gave me a license for 200 shillings.
Mhm.
Literally. And now I could advertise more widely.
Okay.
I could put more videos. I could talk about it. I could put the testimonials. So what happens? Clients use it. They sent us a testimonial. We put up the testimonial and then it was just like wow wow wow crazy like that.
Now before we get we'll come back to the retail and and the moving but let's go back into
um this journey that started with this lady speaking to you at your dad's funeral.
Yeah.
So now by the time you get to um your 100 bottles a day, what's the sourcing journey behind the scenes? H who's collecting the herbs for you? How are they coming? Because that's quite a bit of volume already that you're now doing and you need to boil and and because there are herbs I'm sure there's there's freshness storage. So how is that journey?

12:43
Yeah.
So at the time it was the same lady because I just told her that time maybe she gave me a handful like this and I told her now go bring me 10 kilos.
So she mobilized her group of women.
They're almost like a charmer.
Yes. But they all medicine women.
Okay.
So villages, villages, our villages have those kind of people
who are in this particular kind of culture.
The same way before you'd have your blacksmiths.
So on your rain makers
and now we have our you know our midwives.
Okay.
Because in the in the village most women prefer to use a traditional birth attendant. First of all to get pregnant they use these kind of herbs.
Yes.
Then the whole entire journey they use a traditional birth attendant and a midwife.

13:25
Yes. So that already exists in the culture. So literally it was simple because she's just collecting from people's farms
around there.
Yes.
So because we we use liquid, we make them into a liquid decoction. We use very little in terms of feed stock.
The percentage of feed stock you maybe you need a handful to make 10 bottles. So we don't use as much.
You you dilute it with water or you boil it down.
We boil it down.
Yeah, we boil it down. Now if we were taking all that and making it into using a different process, you'd use a lot of herbs.
So they encourage you use a traditional method.
Yes.
So that you don't deplete the forest.
Yes.
There's also a system where not everybody can um first of all harvest traditional medicine. Not everybody's allowed.

14:10
Yes.
You have to have been given some kind of permission.
So when I went back now, now I'm in this journey talking to different people. Um I spoke to Heather. He ever gave me a small grant of 500,000 shillings
and that was to do what we call um a library kind of like a library of traditional medicine.
I called somebody up who connected me with the Masai in Kiri. Yes.
So we used that amount of money to go and now talk to herbal practitioners. Yes.
That was the beginning. So we went to a place called Leic which is deep in the village in Bomet East.
Then we went to where I come from in Zotic. Then we went to Kiri. So my idea at the time was you know different communities talk to the tit

14:56
because I felt that there was something here that we could document. We were just documenting
and that is how we built the communities
who harvest for us
who we actually buy from.
Now because we buy top dollar
literally
you know we can be spending anything like 500 shillings per kg for these herbs.
It means we limit the competition.
Yes. you know, it's it's actually more lucrative to sell to us.
We have also kind of like forward contracts where if you have a tree and I'm interested in the tree because maybe I'm using four trees in a year or six and I want a mature tree. I buy the tree either ahead
or I make a promisory note to buy the tree from you in five or 10 years. So we started I started now introducing like financial instruments in terms of where will I get my feed stock.

15:44
A localized supply chain so to speak.
Yes. Okay. But I I wasn't taking it so seriously then.
It was just like, "Oh, okay. Well, let's apply. Let's get a bit of money."
Yes.
Then it's like now the business overwhelmed the other work I was doing.
Great problem to have.
Yes, it is cuz you get stressed because um customers want the product
and they want your attention as well
because traditional medicine has
very much the presence of the person making the medicine is essential. Yes. There are clients who will only take it after speaking with you.
Yes.
So it has an interesting spiritual component placebo effect.
Yes.
So now it just got bigger and bigger bigger. So we went from we had our shop in Sa Mall. Then there were my clients on Gong Road who say well we can't get to town.

16:32
So I got another little shop in somewhere on Gong Road.
Then from there we had a friend who said you know what I live in uh Elderet. I can open like a little shop for you. First maybe they're selling from home then they open a little shop. The same happened in Nakuru. I had a friend a classmate was selling from home in Mombasa. Another classmate selling from home in Meu. Another classmate in Kisumu. They graduated into shops
when the volume grew bigger.
Wow.
Then um eventually now our customers would go to HealthyU and demand our product. So healthy approached us and today we supply 34 healthy outlets
for the four liquid products. So that's really how the business grew.
So let's talk a bit now coming back to the product.

17:19
Let's talk about diversification.
So there's the one product that is clear how uh you onboarded it personal problem solved by by the medicine.
Yes.
And the herbal medicine and how do the other products evolve? Do they evolve from this research that you're doing with heav fund uh documentation?
No, no. How how they evolved is literally in that WhatsApp group what women were saying to me is you have helped me but what about my husband? How do we know
that this problem? Because that same product has um multiple functions. Yes.
Really? It's a fertility treatment.
Yes.
And every time you have painful menes, it means you have a problem with fertility.
Yes. So if your menses disappear or like you know amora or they they skip or you know you don't ovulate or you have fibroids too much estrogen

18:13
you have PCOS not enough uh not enough estrogen
or you have multiple miscarriages your progesterone drops too fast
everything related to women's reproductive health is in that product. Okay.
What they would now say is that how do you know it's not my man
go meet Shambarez go back and ask the mas what the men are doing. Okay.
And that's what I did. And the men have their own product as well
you know to clear the you know urinary tract.
Yes.
To prevent prostate cancer to prevent um inflamed prostate
to increase libido a general wellness detox
cuz the men are also cleaning themselves out. the way the women are cleaning themselves, the men are cleaning themselves.

18:55
So that's how I did now my second product. When I went to look at the herbs they were using
cuz I Googled the names and I discovered tendas Africana.
Mhm.
And also muiri in Kikuyu and it is used for prostate cancer medication in Europe for men over 50.
Okay.
And there was a time it was overh harvested in Kenya in the 70s
and even now it is being harvested in a tree. It's a tree.
It's a tree.
Yeah. It's a tree that is used for prostate cancer medication.
So I thought, well,
I'm also going to now create a formulation with this one
based on what I know. I'm going to have something there for digest digestive health. I'm going to have something for insulin resistance. I'm going to have something for infections. At the same time, the same product is really good for uh prostate issues. So when I put together this formulation, this is what I get. This is my formulation. That's how I did the men's product. M

19:50
then the other product was about um CO because again on my page people say how come you've never done anything for CO how can you just sit there pretending to be Mishi Shambares and we don't have something for CO
the name has now stuck Mishi Shambares has become a name
it became a brand it became a brand so
now I was locked in Bmet during CO and what we used to do what um somebody said to meas when we're going through the checkpoints how you make sure your temperature is down so there's like tea that they're all having because we're going to Kericho
so we're going to pass many checkpoints and they're going to check our temperature and they're like you know there was these rumors you know there was this kind of like don't let these people catch you

20:36
so like we're not getting locked up in we take this medication so then I asked uh the guy working on my farm who's now my farm manager
where what are these where can I get them and he showed me And I was like that's my third formulation.
Okay.
Yeah.
Okay.
So that became sagawa. Then now
after you know the funny thing about Kenyans is that they will not let you rest.
They have new requirements for you.
Yes.
After that they're like well my mom has diabetes and you know blood pressure. And for like 2 years every post is like wia blood pressure wia joint pain this. And I had a cousin now in this other side who had kept telling me and I kept ignoring him. I thought I'm going to go and introduce something that doesn't work and I'm going to get in trouble with the authorities.

21:25
Yes.
Then one day I thought okay I'll just do that one anyway.
So he sent me some. I got some from someone else. Remember that right now I have a community of 400
traditional practitioners including the Masai. Yes,
if you go to the Masai where they are in reg and the kipsigis are using the people who are in the periphery of the ma
it's the same ecosystem
and they call it this in kimasai they call it this in kips
the same plant or the same tree
plant
the same plant
so for me I got a combination of that and created moch
mhm
and why I kept the traditional names is that I really wanted you know the people in the village to understand the value they have
and to make sure nobody ever cuts those trees for firewood ever again.

22:16
So for me I was backlinking and thinking this is so amazing. My culture is so amazing. I mean these people will never have to be poor ever again
because they have this botanical treasures.
Yes.
So that's kind of how it it was just going like that.
Mhm.
Yeah. So now um fast forward to today um you have a diversity of products.
Yes.
You have products that um you drink um and for various things you know fertility products
um um
joint pain products and and the rest
but you also have um you've diversified into flowers and other supplements.
Yes. So maybe walk us through the journey of of on boarding more products than
So what used to happen is um how I strengthened my relationship with healthy you is women would come to me and say this is the problem I have.

23:09
So then I'd say yes you can take this bottle
but I want you to go to healthyu and get these supplements or go here get the supplements and this is the kind of food you need to be eating because we take a holistic perspective on the human.
Yes. A lot of these conditions we're struggling with are actually diet related, environmental related. We have changed our diet.
So something is happening epigenetically.
Yes.
What my grandmother was eating is not what I am eating or what my mother was eating.
Yes.
Seeing as my my mother was first generation university and she was here in Nairobi working. Yes.
So the way she was living her life is not similar to her grandmother or her grandmother.

23:45
Okay. So for me I'm reintroducing the traditional lifestyle of whether it's your sleep moderate you know looking at everything your sleep your environment your food are you hydrating
the food now people just resist going elsewhere to get the supplements to get the food they say why can't you just give me everything if you want me to do this what will I eat you know even if you say to them go and get fruits which fruits okay where shall I buy the fruits okay they get to the supermarket okay you told me to blueberries, how many? So, you find you're having to be so prescriptive. It's better when you just say take this.
It's easier on your sales team.
That's how I developed the flowers.

24:27
Okay.
I used again rangorig
and you can find um also in Kissi to mean porridge, food, nutrition.
Yes.
So, in line with you know cultural heritage business because now I I really got excited about the idea of a cultural heritage business.
Yes. Not that I just went and got an idea from out there and came and plastered it on here. I developed from from be behind from beneath.
Yes.
So that's how I developed my ROI FL with different things with mukbero cuz I wanted to bring in other cultures other communities to explore what they have.
And then I now decided to do the supplements. The supplements really uh whether it's super fertility, super vitality, super immunity again are to support the other products.

25:14
Yes.
So that if your nutrition is low,
if you can't get hold of these supplements, if you walk into some place and you can't understand what is there, vitamin C, vitamin D, vitamin D, vitamin E, vitamin K, you know, selenium, zinc, iron, it's so frustrating. I put it together for you into superfertility.
Okay. Yeah.
Okay. Okay. Now let's let's speak a bit about packaging because uh from uh that journey of uh do you have empty coke bottles? You're going to your neighbors. You now have some pretty swanky packaging and it's very modern. It's very nice. I I I the products you sent me to sample
which I'm really enjoying by the way. But tell tell me a bit about your packaging journey.

25:59
So initially we just get bottles from Safe Park.
Yes.
And then we'd just print labels. Everything was just kind of organic. You have a friend who does the design for you.
Then they tell you about somebody else who can print them for you somewhere in town.
Same with brochures. The usual marketing.
Yes.
Then now people started now copying. I I had a lot of counterfeits.
So I had people who would buy the bottle,
rip the label off,
dilute
into two bottles and then now they are selling as Harriet's Botanical. So I was really struggling with counterfeating with um theft because the bottles all look alike. It's easy to get that bottle.
Yes.
So I developed my new bottle last year. It it took a while

26:40
because I could not find a mold maker locally.
Mhm.
And I could not So the it was very expensive as well to do it in the EU. So I then talked to somebody who showed me how to do it in India.
Yes. And then I developed a mold and the mold was brought here and now I have just one supplier of bottles
and it is embossed Harriet's Botanicals and it has my number at the bottom
and the and the and the the mold is yours.
Yes.
So you've fabricated the mold in India and a local supplier. Is it a plastic plastic
plastic supplier you give them the mold and they now manufacture?
Yes. And it had to be pharmaceutical grade high density plastic.
Pharmaceutical grade high density plastic.

27:22
Yes. For me. Yeah. So I was
specifically that why did you have to
you see before I used to use um I think they just call it PET.
Yes.
Just regular plastic. Now regular plastic maybe will leech into the product and you can't meet regulatory requirements with that bottle.
Okay. Okay.
So since I was sort of on multiple fronts facing with or facing off with regulation you see this is medicine.
Okay.
So the the regulatory requirements are quite high
and I am trying to meet all the different regulatory bodies.
Okay. So this is my journey into even changing my packaging, making it very unique.
So making sure nobody can counterfeate because if there's counterfeit being produced out there, I am still the the kind of the buck stops with me.

28:04
The liability is still coming your way.
Somebody out there will be consuming a Harris botanicals product which I did not produce.
Yes.
And if they get sick,
it'll still come back to me.
So that was sort of my I was more battling with regulation.
Yes. than trying to become swanky or whatever. And there are Kenyans who are like as long as you produce it in that PET I will not buy it. Up until today there are people who want it in a glass bottle which is we will also migrate to that like I call it the bougie market who only take this kind of thing in a glass bottle
but portability because I have clients all over the country and we use the shuttles
and we use riders. So in terms of glass bottle became a little bit um difficult not portable at all. You can't put it in a DHL box to go out of the country.

28:51
Yes. Okay, perfect. But um and I guess aligned with packaging, we have to now come into manufacturing.
Your volumes have increased. You're selling from something you would uh boil at the back of your house. Yes.
You've now um gone and set up a manufacturing entity.
Yes. So um maybe marry your supply chain where you have these 400 people around the country who are collecting for you different hubs BS and the like you come you bring them to a central location. Yes.
Maybe walk us through your journey of setting up that manufacturing entity.
So what the intent because now those 10 goals were in the house.
Yes.
In fact they were just like in front of the garage
and then the garage is where I used to put the feed stock

29:37
and it's just kusha in the back.
Yes. Then it's like now the the kitchen is the labeling room.
The dining room is like the administrative.
The front of the house is dispatch.
So then now it's it was just like I took over the whole house.
Yes.
And my sister said to me now everything here is Harris Botanicals. Harris Botanicals. So literally I had to move out of the house.
So I went just around to like a local business park. I was first of all just looking for an office. cuz I said if I sit in this office I can do the dispatch from here
and stop disturbing people in the house who are doing other things as well.
So in that same place then literally when um when we came back from co the volume was so high we now needed to to now produce in a more efficient way. M

30:23
and so where we went to at that time in the same business park we we had these vats
we we um we had somebody working with us an engineer my technical director you met him earlier
who we created these vats from the whole idea of the milk the milk industry
and then we'd boil inside those vats
okay
and that space actually we were there for 4 years or 4 and 1/2 years and the volumes just kept going up up until now this year I moved into a bigger space in the same business park but I took triple the space because I needed now to do good manufacturing practices which I had learned under Kenya association of manufacturers program.
Okay.
So I needed a wet room, I needed a dry room,

31:05
I needed a dispatch room, I needed a finished goods area, I needed um a dispatch room and I needed an office for the staff
like the administrative staff.
So it's like my team was growing. I needed more space.
Yes. And now I can produce up to 2,000 bottles a day.
Okay.
Yeah.
Okay.
And that's just much easier to work with than this 100 bottles a day. And then you can the the distribution process is just way more efficient.
So let's talk a bit about you talk about the vats. These were locally fabricated boiling vats that you have now fabricated designed to your specifications and fabricated for you to what you used to boil on the jo. now boiling in in the boiling vines

31:46
and now we use gas
and you and you're now on LPG. Okay. Excellent.
Cuz the idea had even been to try and go solar. Yes.
But the it it didn't work at that time. We we didn't have the capacity.
Yes.
And the space to create
to create enough solar power
cuz I was trying to be like zero waste, you know. Now all this u my western education was kicking in.
I wanted to be zero waste, you know, renewable energy
and all that. Yes. cuz you know GO are not really healthy and they pollute the environment. So this is why we migrated to this system where it's a closed fat system.
Yes.
And even now as you're doing your bottling and your labeling, now you're thinking about things like which bacteria.

32:27
So we do at at feed stock level, we do moisture content
and we check some parameters right in the village.
It's transported here by G4S.
Here again we have to do the moisture content and the pH and observe the feed stock. Yes.
Once the feed stock gets into the wet room, it's a controlled environment,
sanitized, highly sanitized controlled environment where we have your the thermal hydroscopies, you know, we we check the thermometer, we check the the the degree, the degrees that you use to heat them up.
So there's all these different levers and we also built a lab.
Yes.
And the lab is to check for your stafylocus, your E.coli, coli,
all the things that are not supposed to be in that product because these are the things I was struggling with before.

33:11
Yes.
So that then I can get the quality guys to check and to write a report to say
this is free of this.
It's at the right pH.
Everything. I also brought in a reverse osmosis machine to purify the water. So we purify our own water
that you use.
Yes.
Okay. Okay.
So that whole entire process including how we bottle
and how we label it has to be 100% sanitized. Yes. So these good manufacturing practices had to be introduced
because in as much as they are supplements, they're also medicine.
Yes.
Right. And since we don't put any additives, no preservatives, everything is 100% natural and you store it at room temperature.
Yeah.
That way you your process has to be 100% controlled from the beginning all the way up to the end.

33:54
Okay. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Man, your you your yours is such an interesting story because um one of the things we aim to do in the podcast is to tell the story of local context.
Yeah.
And you've now taken um I think I'm fair in saying that you've taken a very local product. Yeah. Mhm.
A a herbalist nutrition, nutrition and medicinal product that's created um from local herbs and bs and and other ingredients and you've brought it into the 21st century.
Yes.
From a parking p perspective, from a manufacturing and I think that's the ultimate story of Africans doing because these are the things I think that we lost. you know uh when when we say we lost culturally during colonialism I think these are the kind of things because I recall a time growing up where miti shamba was not a good word you know it was not like something to be proud of you know in fact in kisahili um there was people used to use mchawi

34:59 and mitish shamba interchangeably you know ganga mchawi and mitish shamba they used and one is a medicine man and one is a witch you Exactly. And those are two totally different things.
So let's talk about retail because I met you through retra uh which you joined and and you now have retail fronts. Yeah. So from your first shop at Sawasau Mall which was uh again another organic growth. You're now an out andout retailer. So you're like um you have the complete process loop because you manufacture
and while you do have some distributorship relationships with healthy you and the like.
Yes.
You you you also have Harriet's Botanical Shops.
Yes.
So let's talk about your retail journey in terms of finding spaces out those spaces

35:50
brand look and feel standardization of that. How has that journey been for you?
So it was it was interesting. I mean um I had this Sour Mall was a new mall.
It's not easy to get into these big malls if you're not known.
So first I had Sour Mall.
I had another a very tiny strip mall on Gong Road
Sooafi
where it was easy to get into those spaces
at Sit. I had a desk on Tuesday. There was an organic farmers market there.
Okay. I think I was there for 3 years
before they actually allowed me based on that relationship
to convert into a pop-up
and I had to do a lot of meetings back and forth,
talk to the management. It it was a bit of a long process and that's when I discovered it's not easy to get into these malls.

36:35
Yes.
Established malls, you know.
Yes. The established malls.
Yeah.
Then um BBS was new also. Any of these new malls, they were looking for new tenants.
So it was easy to get into BBS. And I was now using I was now trying to brand
in the sense that I must have the logos. I must have the signage. Just things I learned along the way. When you go into any mall and you look at any shop, you're going to see their signage. You're going to see how they've done the, you know, the shelves and everything. So I was trying to be like um like an apothecary, like an African apothecary.
Excellent. Yeah.
So now what then happened is I tried to get into Junction, I I couldn't get in. I went to Garden City, I couldn't get in. I went to TRM, I couldn't get in. So I went to Rupert Mall, Elderate, I couldn't get in. So I noticed that these malls have anchor tenants who have to be consulted and if there's something someone in there doing something similar,

37:29
they won't let you in.
Yes.
But in in a sense, Kenyans see your business as real only when they see you in different places looking the same. So you have to standardize.
Yes. So that's when I now developed my relationship with healthyu and said if I'm not on gong road health you are on gong road I'm not on thicker road I have a lot of clients on thicker road well garden city and trm healthyu
on mombasa road it'll be Imara and um there's one more capital center
yes
in a place like yanuki I'm not there there's a healthy
in Mombasa where I am it's not so well known though it's in the CBD
right I'm in Bhani tower but then there's healthy you nali there's healthy you greenwood relates [Music] botanical shop.

38:19
Mhm.
Even with all these distributors, literally a client will walk in and they will call us. They will call our customer service and we will do we will take it from there because what we do that other people don't do is give you this end to end literally therapeutic experience. Okay,
you can sit there for as long as you want and tell us your problems. And that's what Kenyan women want.
They want to walk into your shop and tell you all their problems to
if they're having problems with um you know conceiving, it means they're having problems in their marriage, the relationship, there's an auntie talking assistant-in-law,
there's other things. So, you have to listen to all that.

38:57
And that's why we also developed a CRM
so that you know we can document what our clients are saying to us. When they come to our shop, we already know what's going on with them. We know they've taken three bottles. We know they have endometriosis. We know they're not able to conceive or they've had multiple miscarriages.
The conversations happening in our shops are not happening anywhere else apart from with doctors.
But if you go to your your doctor, it's going to be expensive.
So literally for that bottle, you get a lot of therapy
and you get a lot of ideas.
That's what we're doing in the retail space.
Okay. And how many retail outlets do you have across the country? 15. And what's the footpint?

39:36
Nairobi. What's the split or where are they?
Okay. I have four in Nairobi. I have two in Nakuru. I have one in Kisumu. I have one in Kericho. I have one in Elit. I have Mombasa. Kitangela Nasha Kissi.
Wow.
Yeah.
That's a really impressive that's a really impressive uh retail footprint. And then of course you have strategic partnerships with the likes of Healthy U. Any other?
Not yet. I mean we've been talking to my da.
Okay. Yeah.
Excellent. Let's speak a bit about um export because we were talking earlier and you did let me know that you do export out of out of the country. So how did that start? Is it the same from Facebook? Uh people reading your comments and then asking I want this stuff and you now have a bit of uh um export business. How does that work?

40:24
The clients mainly come from Instagram and they're all over the world. They're in Qatar.
Yes.
Many are Kenyans.
Yes.
Or and Nigerians. I have a big Nigerian
um client base in Oklahoma.
So if one one found me
and she was treating fibroids, couldn't get pregnant, she got pregnant, she got all her cousins, all her friends, they are my clients.
Yes.
Then I have Australia. I don't know how it happened in Australia. I think there's a big Kenyan population there.
Yes, there is.
I have Canada and I have the US.
So you can find a client based in Australia. Mhm.
When they come and they pick up the product and it works, they start sort of like they are the ones spreading the word out there.

41:01
So this is still very organic.
And one time we did a Spice FM um show and we got a lot of new customers based in the diaspora.
Yes.
So I would say the diaspora are still Africans. This why I say my products are for the Africans in in the in the cities and in the diaspora. Okay.
That's who I'm trying to reach. Mhm.
I'm not trying to compete with, you know, pharmaceuticals out there doing fertility medication, IVF,
because I feel that that population has already a lot of support,
but who supports Africans
in their reproductive health or, you know, in their issues, their their
that are unique to them.
Yes. Exactly.
There's actually hardly anybody.
Okay.
So, because of what we've done, more people are beginning to look at the African market.

41:46
Yes.
Yeah.
Okay. and and and so how do you distribute now to those markets that you're in in
the same thing like literally it was so difficult to send bottles. So one time um I called up uh DHL somewhere in Karen and I said they said yeah come along and I went and I took 100 bottles I was so excited and then the next day they rejected them and said these are going to be rejected at the border so we're not taking them. M so for a while though I had gone to keis and I had gone to all the different places Camry to get the different certification so that I could export
then they said this won't even go through EU borders it nothing will happen
2 years later they approached me and said we have DHL express for small businesses

42:28
yes
and then my website became retail enabled
and next thing those bottles crossed the borders I don't know how they do it
okay
so I can send anywhere in the world with DHL Express
excellent In any case, people can put it in their suitcase
and it goes through.
Just like say this is herbal medicine, this is a tea.
Yeah.
So maybe let's talk about the numbers because you're is 5 years. You're 5 years in now.
Uh first of all, congratulations for getting to 5 years. That is a milestone in and of itself,
but what what are we looking at of the scale of the business? Of course, you from your first uh was it 100 bottles a day?
Yes. I mean,
how are your volumes looking today? I would say anything between 5 to 7,000 uh bottles a month.

43:14
Wow. Wow. A month.
Yeah.
Excellent.
Mhm.
Excellent.
Now, um let's go into crystal ball.
Yeah.
Before we go into the future, let's talk a bit about has your business been uh entirely organic or or how has the capital journey uh been? So it's
capital first and then uh let's say policy licensing next. How has that journey been for Harriet?
So for capital apart from the 500,000 I received from he I haven't received a capital injection.
Everything has been bootstrapping.
Mhm.
And half the time literally it's something that needs to get done.
We use the money that we're making to get it done.
Yes.
You know save up money, get a mold, save up money. Now we have let's say some few millions expand production. Now we have maybe two three million available. Let's expand. Let's you know do something with these vats.

44:15
So very organic.
Absolutely very organic. I mean I've been started talking to people about where I can get money if I needed to do you know something really something big
and something that can make me compliant with um EU and US regulations. Yes. because I'm trying to manufacture now in a way that I can export their B2B
so that I can supply
can get into the whole foods of this world and other big brands globally.
Exactly.
And we've even been speaking with um I met some people at I think at um at a CAM event
who are like a French the French the French government is looking for companies that want to set to set up production
in any of their French to territories. M
so when I went to speak to them and say okay this is the kind of money that I need to do that I start thinking about who would I speak to as a financier

45:04
and now I'm at this place where I think first things first to organize my board which I only had like an informal board now to formalize my board
and this year we're doing a lot on commercial strategy
okay
literally we are streamlining all our processes we're looking at all our people we're looking at who we need we're looking at all our systems we're making sure all our systems are working so the last here has been gruelling in terms of fixing fixing what isn't working,
bringing in what will work better for us,
identifying the kind of staff we need cuz we were just like growing, growing, selling, selling, growing, growing.
Now, this year it's been a little bit slow.
So, this has now made me think about,

45:45
you know, why am I not why do I sell, let's say, I sell a lot of the women's product, why don't I sell as much of the men's? So we look at our commercial strategy as well in terms of how do we speak to men, how do we advertise.
So that's where we are now.
Okay.
Yeah.
What about policy? You're you're in a a bit of a cutting edge space because u most shamba people
um still are in the plastic bottle phase and they're selling you this root concoction of them. But you have now taken it for more.
Yes. Yes. So, how has your journey been through with the standard bodies, the the the various licensing bodies and and how has your experience been on that front?
Yeah, I've had no problems with um the licenses. I mean, I am the one who pushes

46:33
like now a pharmacy and poisons board only just released a traditional medicine um criteria.
Okay.
I think it was in 20 just in the last few years
as a result of the work you're doing or
I Yes. Not just me. I think other people yes
I think kebs also released a standard if I'm not wrong last year so that the reason we are upgrading
is to meet the standards so some of our products are eligible already under existing standards and we have those
and others just fall under ministry of culture
okay
so I've been pushing the legislators I mean if I meet them I think I met one legislator just at an organic farmers market and I was just badgering her because I said you please need to talk about this you need to legislate. I will do all the work. I will do the research.

47:20
I will do all the underlying work. I will talk to my legal team who can draft
and we you can use us as a benchmark as a study.
So for me, I'm pushing the legislators.
What legislation are you looking for?
I want it to come under Ministry of Health,
right? And I want clear regulations and clear guidelines on how you manufacture, how you distribute
everything around traditional medicine. Mhm.
And I wanted to
a traditional medicine act of sorts.
Yes.
Yes. That covers that whole space.
Yes. And nothing what we don't want is something too vague.
Yes.
We want something that somebody in the village can say I just need to get this this this.
Let's say I'm in Kisumu

48:00
and there's all these like medicines or cha whatever they are
in my backyard and I have an interest. Where do I go?
Do I go to Kiri? Can give me the facilities?
Can I build the facilities? M
can a group of people come together form a cooperative and say well we have
you know we have frankincense
if you look at the Somali community they have a lot of these botanical treasures
if you go to meu you can say the the mira the plant
can become a botanical
right you can make tinctures you can make oils you can make a salve
you can make something that you drink that's not an intoxicant
so I want people like myself
to know what they need to do to take the botanical treasures they have, even if it's medicine,

48:46
and convert it into a modern product that can be sold globally.
So, there's a lot of work to do in the in the whole entire industry.
I really like that term botanical treasures. Yeah. Because I think that's what they are.
Yes.
And and it it's it's it's
there's strength in looking inward in that way in the way that you're looking. And I I I like the fact that you're doing it or you're exploring it from a legislative perspective because then
we capture
in essence you are now
I would say defining the system
because ultimately um I think what we need to learn as Kenyans is that's how the law works.
Yes. Yes.
You know the law is for us. It's not the other way around, you know,

49:32
because if we're going to be this innovative nation that is inventing new things, we also need to learn how to legislate around what we'll create, which I think is the journey that you're going through.
Yes.
And to create the the intellectual capacity.
Yeah.
If you might have somebody like me whose mitares is in the middle, but you see, I need a pharmaceutical.
Yes.
Someone who knows that. Maybe I need doctors. I work with doctors now.
Okay. So I need the health profession,
okay,
to support me and help me develop the products. If I wanted to do clinical trials, who would I work with?
Where would I get the funding? What are the parameters?
So you see, you need the doctors, you need the people who make policy,

50:15
you need it's it's a whole entire industry. If I want to do skinare like I am developing a skincare line.
Yes.
Based on the same botanical treasures of the rift valley. So now for me I worked with a chemical engineer who is actually a skinare manufacturer.
I mean I had access to that kind of person. It's not cheap right and she's not accessible to somebody else let's say in Yanuki
who wants to create a skinare line that can compete
with all the foreign brands that are in our market.
So for me I just think there's so much to do.
Yes.
And you know I'm willing to be like this the guinea pig.
Excellent.
Yeah. So you've mentioned and maybe just touch briefly on you worked with doctors.

50:58
Yeah.
So your your your very these are African traditional medicines and supplements.
So how are you working with doctors? Are you working
maybe just walk us through how that journey is with your working with doctors and what are you creating with them?
So what happened with because when we when our clients come to us we say we want to see your ultrasound, we want to see your report. what did your gy say age weight you know we have this like I think they call it triage
we have our own triage in terms of what we ask the clients so
what our clients have started started doing is they go to a doctor with our product
and they tell them you can do anything to me yes you do the ultrasound you do but me I'm going to take this product I want you to know

51:42
our clients started now literally harassing their doctors because they don't want this other like medication which they think gives side effects.
Yes.
You know, so literally now the doctors are asking, "Who is this? Who's Harriet? Who is doing this?" I had another client who was using my product for pain and she went into Kenyata Hospital to take out 40 fibroids.
And when they asked her, "How come you're no longer in pain?" She said, "Of course, I'm taking Harriet's products." And they're like, "Ah,
because now whether it's a hospital, you know, the public ones, people in there are using my product." So the doctors decided especially in my shop at the waterfront clinic. So you have clients coming picking up my product going into the clinic or going into the clinic coming to my product. So then they put me into their group and they said your customers are here come and talk to them. We're not we're not going to be the ones to explain it

52:40
to them. And this is how I developed that relationship.
Amazing.
And I said you see let us now work together. you know, you must see a doctor because you you have people who don't want to talk to doctors anymore.
Yes.
Women who say, "Ah, no, no, no. I've been through that. I don't want that at all. I don't want the medicine. I don't want a painkiller."
Yeah.
You sort me out. And I always say, you know, we're holistic as Africans. We don't reject science. You know, we have our ancient sciences as well. This is a science.
Yes, it is.
So, we don't reject knowledge that we've received from other cultures. We work with it. We integrate it. So you can still work with a nutritionist and you can work with your gynecologist as you take our product.

53:19
Excellent.
That is sort of our approach.
Excellent.
Harriet, I mean what a fabulous fabulous story. I think uh um allow me first to just give you your flowers when you're sitting here. I think it's a fabulous thing that you're doing. The fact that you've been able to take what is uh traditional African culture and you're basically curating it in a modern context is something worthy of celebration. Yeah.
Thank you.
But the also that you're taking this and putting it first on a local map and then creating a worldclass product that is exportable
and aspiring to do it even better is something very very admirable. We here at the African do podcast wish you all the very best. Thank you so much.

54:03
Um I think I'll I'll give you a chance now to just speak to uh the audience and tell them where can they find you, whether can can they find you digitally on social media so that those that do not know you or do not know of you both locally and internationally can then start to engage with who you are and and hopefully become customers and products. Yeah.
So online, you know, we are all over. We're on Facebook, we're on uh Tik Tok, we're on Twitter, we're on YouTube, we're on Instagram. Um we also have a website, Harrietbotanicals.co.ke. Um you'd find us online everywhere. People are talking about us everywhere and we are talking back to them as well.
Uh we have 15 shops out here. You can go to any healthy you actually and find our four liquid products. Uh if you want to actually buy from the diaspora, you can go to the website and we'll send the product to you wherever in the world you are.

55:00
Excellent.
Excellent. So ladies and gentlemen, here is that was a fabulous story of I think what we are about on this podcast is Africans executing with excellence and Harriet has taken what is our traditional culture and products and curated them in a modern context and is now selling them to the world and we celebrate that. So, thank you very much for joining us in episode 26 and we look forward to seeing you in the future and we wish Harriet's Botanicals all the very best as they continue to grow and develop a Santennis.