Mauritius: Chrystel

After countless applications to work as a teacher, Chrystel describes a tough period where she never received an affirmative reply. Mother of three children, Chrystel was determined to financially contribute to her household, all while devoting more time to her children. She then came across soaps formulated from natural bases, and intrigued by the idea, decided to start a business in that. However, the main driving force stemmed from past personal experiences. Chrystel shares that she has always struggled with skin and acne problems. Despite consulting several doctors, spending a lot of money of medicines and other chemical cures, she never found relief. It was only when she approached an ayurvedic doctor when her skin started to change for the better. The doctor suggested her to start using basic, natural products which can be easily found in the kitchen, for instance Saffron or honey. Keeping past experiences in mind, Chrystel concluded that she would feel much better pursuing a business in natural soap production, with an aim of helping people going through the same struggles as she did in the past.

Besides driven by the will to help people, Chrystel is extremely passionate about how common ingredients from the kitchen can lead to almost miraculous concoctions. She shares that the soap business enables her to express her creativity, where she can experiment with the mixture of different ingredients to manufacture a bar of soap. While saffron, green tea, and charcoal are her most used ingredients to make soap, she has also started using those ingredients to experiment with scrubs, carbon masks, oil massages for body, hair, as well as other varieties of skin care natural products. Her products cater to different types of clients, ranging from kids to elderly people, or people suffering from skin problem such as acne, scars or redness. More than often, people buy soaps, unknown of its contents, smitten by its scent. It’s only when one reads the list of ingredients and searches for the meaning or composition that one realizes the amount of harsh chemicals we are subjecting our body to. When Chrystel manufactures her products from scratch, she uses ingredients which naturally soften and heal the skin, for instance olive oil and honey. Hence, there is a level of transparency between her and the customers, where they know what they are applying to their body.

Chrystel has a well-functioning Facebook Page, where she shares pictures and prices of her products. Additionally, she tries to include the testimonials of clients, and pictures showing before-after results to establish the credibility of her products. She also has a business card, which she shares with all clients. Her soap garners excellent reviews from customers, and in fact, her pool of clients consists of several recurring customers who then turn into a loyal customer base. This is because her products generate instantaneous results which increase the probability of a first-time user returning for a second trial. Hence, once the skin has adapted to a specific product, she knows that she has secured a loyal customer base. Additionally, most people after first time results, return to purchase an entire pack of mask, soap and shampoo, rather than only a usual bar of soap. They then spread the word, creating a customer chain, and spreading the benefits of her soaps to the neighborhood. Also, Chrystel’s products are affordable, given their background of natural formation and range from Rs50 to Rs125.

To kickstart the soap business, Chrystel was initially driven by her passion, but she reiterates that her will to invest in creation was dormant until she participated in the Gender Links training for Women Entrepreneurs. After multiple tries to get a job, and facing several failures, Chrystel shared feeling cut off from the world and experienced a fall in her self-esteem. She failed to trust her own capacity and what she could achieve. Gender Links training, as she recounts, helped her rebuild her self-esteem, while encouraging her to believe in herself first and foremost, that she is as capable as others, and her dreams can be translated to reality. She was then prompted to take control of her life, to stop being victimized by situation and to prevent petty failures from molding the turn of her life. Post the training, Chrystel was motivated to take charge and further enrolled in a Leadership course to enhance her skills. Now, with an aim to take her basic knowledge a notch higher, she is following a training with the National Women Council to specialize herself in the production of soaps, shampoos and body lotions.

The role of Social Media and the Internet is pivotal for the development of her business, as Chrystel shares. She is part of a Facebook Group called “Afro Entrepreneurs” in Africa, where she is apprised of latest improvements in soap-making, tools and tricks to enhance the quality of her products and improve her customer base. She regularly participates in online teleconferences with Afro Entrepreneurs, which are a form of online training, where specialists share their best practices and lessons learnt. Chrystel always innovates by going beyond their advice and building on their ideas. For instance, one of the most recent innovations has been the use of cereals (oatmeal) and activated carbon as scrubs. Chrystel also shared her participation in an international writing competition, where she was shortlisted as a finalist. The essay-writing competition’s prompt was ‘The Inspiring Black Woman’, whereby Chrystel’s submission included her growth as an active woman in her community, and how her work has positively impacted people around her. However, she could not attend the finals in Quebec due to difficulties in visa procedures.

Chrystel’s customers range from as near as her neighborhood to as far as France- her products seem to touch the hearts of everyone. She has a regular customer in France, whereby she carries out her delivery via postal services of Mauritius. She is very flexible when it comes to payment of products, such that some clients purchase in advance, but pay her at the end of the month. However, she keeps an account of all entry and exit of cash in a written notebook. Since her business is a budding one, she reinvests all profits made. Therefore, she is trying to apply for a loan to expand her business and buy more raw materials. Since the soap mold takes a lot of time to set, it would be profitable if she could build a reserved stock of raw materials to manufacture several soaps well in advance and hence, cater for a growing customer base. However, despite none of the profits being saved, Chrystel views the business as a potential revenue contributor to the household. She is working towards growing her, such that she can save some of the profits to run the house.

In the future, Chrystel wants to specialize in soap production and create a name for herself in the business both locally and internationally, given her connections via the Afro Entrepreneurs group. She aspires to develop a brand of natural products such as soaps, shampoos, lotions, and even a complete care set. As of now, she is already working on the procurement of barcodes to include in the package of her products, hence copyrighting her creation. While she currently sells her product to a professional therapeutic masseuse , she hopes to collaborate with hotels in her area to increase her customer base, since tourists prefer natural, exotic and ayurvedic products. Hence starting from a woman in doubt of her own abilities, to leading a growing soap-production venture, Chrystel has come a long way, and her dedication proves that there is more beyond the bend.