CNN 2010-12-24

I mean retail 1 -- well the word retail is always the leading sector 2 where you can judge a lot of things for how the economy is going. I mean look at what retail was many years ago. Some parts of East Africa are still informal. We -- retail brings a lot of formalization of trade, a lot of formalization of things that you would create. Changing lifestyles is what we are known for. And we have changed the lifestyles of many by bringing products from all over the world and giving them an experience which is new.So they say why can't we do what they're doing in developed worlds?

Why did you think that a -- a supermarket idea or like a -- a mega market, as it were, would work in East Africa?

I mean Kenya, whenever we looked at it, there was a lot of opportunities around. A lot of Kenyans would travel abroad and bring their meats from either Dubai or London or wherever they would be traveling. And a lot of them had not the opportunity to travel.So we said there is a market. There is the money around. There is the knowledge of people here that a lot of products are available out -- outside there and they want the products here.

And there -- there's a lot of talk of Walmart buying all or parts of -- of Massmart in Southern Africa.Do you think this will bring in -- do you think a big U.S. company coming in will bring in more competition for you in East Africa?

Definitely 3. I mean a U.S. giant player like Walmart, the world's number one player, coming into Africa, means competition. But it also means that there is a lot of confidence for the market out there in Africa, that there is a market in Africa. They would otherwise not be interested in coming here.So it leaves us a lot of food for thought for us to start expanding very fast. And there is that market and take care of that market, let the other players come in, but still try to do what you can best.

Does it keep you up at night, thinking that Walmart is coming into the market?

It actually encourages me to say we are in a store -- in -- in Africa, where Walmart also is thinking of coming. So from day one here, we have the right choice of being where we want.

What -- what benefit can Walmart bring in?You know, they -- they are so well known as sourcing cheap products, particularly from Asia.I mean, do you think that will, in general, be a struggle for, you know, Nakumatt, Shop-Rite (ph), these -- these companies -- to -- to compete with that sort of business model?

Definitely. Their buying volumes do -- would make a difference. But would we still look at that kind of product or what would be the Walmart approach?Would it be that they want to get it for the mass market at very cheap products?Or would it be that they want to look at the middle plus class?So I think I still -- we would still have an upper edge.

So when you go to Rwanda or Uganda and you see -- you visit your stores, I mean what do you feel like?What sort of emotion do you have given where you -- you know where your company has come from in this relatively 4 short period.I mean for me, it's always the question, what's next?What can I introduce as the next product to make it more exciting and more interesting?Every time I visit a store, which I try to do at least to visit every Nakumatt store at least once a month, out of the country, and once a week inside the country, most probably, and try to do something new, something exciting, something different.

So there's always the challenge of keeping up with excitement. So whatever we have done so far, you will see we are steps ahead than many of the stores, if you compare us with Walmart stores layout 5 and us, maybe I would be proud to even say with a little step higher than them.