True Entrepreneurs Never Retire

Working with entrepreneurs, one discovers that for most of them, success did not come easy.

It came with a great deal of sweat and toil, long working hours, short holidays and little time for socialising.

With zeal, determination and perseverance, smart and hard-working entrepreneurs persistently and consistently conquer challenges and obstacles.

Stories differ in content, but there is a common denominator, like the failure to secure a loan when it is most needed, being let down and disappointed by staff, suppliers and business partners, or being smothered by red tape and bureaucracy at one time or another is part of the process.

These are only a few of the obstacles encountered along the entrepreneurial path, but then again, there is a proverb about gold refining requiring much heat and energy.

Take for example the late Johannes Benade, who was known within the Rehoboth community as ‘Land Benade’, and by the younger generation as ‘Oom Land’.

He never attended school.

However, driven by a ‘can-do, will-do’ attitude, the late Benade was one of the country’s most successful entrepreneurs in his time, providing jobs for scores of Namibians.

Brought up by his paternal grandmother, Benade spent his childhood helping around the farm and later gained bricklaying skills.

Applying the resourcefulness acquired from his grandmother and with the encouragement of an uncle, Benade ventured into business funded by a loan of 100 pounds from Hans Dentlinger.

Benade started his entrepreneurial journey trading as a hawker.

He experienced numerous setbacks along the way, including his entire investment in stock being confiscated by the authorities.

This was more of a setback than a deterrent and served as a lesson for him to work smart by deploying a strategy to circumvent officialdom and get goods to the market.

For customers, it demonstrated their dependency on Benade to always find a way to get them what they wanted when they needed it.

From humble beginnings, Benade developed a business over half a century with diverse interests that included a supermarket, hardware and building material shop, a property portfolio and an auctioneering business.

When asked to share his recipe for business success, Benade highlighted the paramount importance of quality and service excellence, and an orderly workplace with controls in place to manage the risk of pilferage and stock losses.

Entrepreneurs fail because they lack financial discipline, he said.

Benade said they find it difficult to separate income generated by the business from personal money.

Another shortcoming to guard against, he said, is a love for consumption, indulgence and material trappings, which will erode the resources needed to fund business operations and growth.

Long before his death, Benade put a succession plan in place and the business leadership baton was passed on to his children who chose to work in the family business.

Until days before his death, Benade would spend his days at the shop he started and grew from 28 square metres into a modern supermarket.

Ever smiling, he greeted and chatted to customers, helped with tasks in the store and generally demonstrated that true entrepreneurs never retire.

• Danny Meyer is reachable at danny@smecompete.com