Turning trash into cash: PE mom starts her own innovative business
Naomi Ledoux, a working mom from PE, saw a way to turn trash into cash by creating a fashionable range of handbags made from plastic.
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The mom from PE collected wrappers from sweets, biscuits and chocolates and turned them into handcrafted handbags and journal covers.
She admits that the birth of her company was due to various circumstances, merged with her "OCD of waste." When her family relocated to PE, she did not want their housekeeper to be unemployed, and so MyAfricanMum was born.
MyAfricanMum’s primary collection, The Unwrapping Sweet Conversation, was launched in 2016 and it is extremely popular.
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Source: Facebook
MyAfricanMum’s business approach is making a valuable contribution to the United Nations (UN)’s 12th sustainable development goal (SDG) of responsible consumption and production.
Naomi says her CAs(SA) chartered accountant skills have helped her in this new venture. She believes the knowledge and understanding gained by CAs(SA) in their day-to-day operations offers a critical view of economies and educated insights.
She says when they first received a handbag order from the Unwrapping Sweet Conversation collection, she would say to the customer:
“This bag is going to draw a lot of attention, are you ready for it?”
She adds that it is humbling to receive positive messages from customers.
According to GoodThingsGuy.com, Naomi says that the most fulfilling aspect of her work is seeing the result and knowing that she has helped reduce waste in the process.
Naomi does the basic design, but the wrapper selection is left to the crafters.
They also avoid custom orders, because special requests for specific wrappers have led the team to spending days trying to find them when the aim is to use the recycled wrappers at hand.
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Source: Facebook
It takes about two days to make a clutch bag, another two more days for a medium bag and a little over a week for a very large handbag.
“As a purpose-led profession, it’s on all of us to make our own ripple and start transforming the world into a better place, community by community.”
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Source: Briefly News
