Kitimbwa Group

Thank you for your loan. It has been disbursed to the Kitimbwa Group group, consisting of Sarah Bbako, Hassan Malinzi, Fred Muwonge, Gerald Kitaka, Haruna Kituyi, Godfrey Minani, Fred Semuyingo, Steven Sekaweesi, Keneth Mutavu, Godfrey Senabulya, Robinah Namusisi by Pearl Microfinance Limited in Uganda. We are excited to watch this business grow. Over the next 4 months, Pearl Microfinance Limited will be collecting repayments from this entrepreneur and posting progress updates on the Kiva website.

I must admit that the first time Bbako Sarah narrated her story to me when I visited her group, I was touched and prayed that she succeeds and surely she is doing just that. She has been able to increase the volume of hair pieces, weaves and chemicals in her salon shelves and this has come with more customers. Customers like having a variety to choose from and with this, Sarah believes that she is at peace without the return of the man who abandoned her at a very trying moment when she was pregnant with twins. She is able to feed them now and saves for their education when they are ready for school.

Sarah’s hair salon has continued grow as have her children. When we visited her, we found her busy working on a client’s hair, and her children playing and dancing about.

Sarah is planning to take another loan now that she has successfully repaid her original loan. She says that she was able to see a real difference in her life during the loan period. She explained that taking a loan allowed her to buy her hair styling materials in bulk. When she buys hair braids one at a time they are 12,000 USH but when she had a loan she was able to buy in bulk at 8,500 USH each.

She has implemented a way to keep track of all of her expenses so that she can track exactly how much profit she makes on each client. Although the profits are small, when she keeps track of everything then she knows that she has money to spend on her children for food and clothes.

In the future, Sarah would like to expand her business further. She has some experience doing bridal hair and decorating, so she would like to try to expand her business into that area. Then if she is really successful she would like to buy some chairs and some tents to rent to the brides who come to her for hair services.

Sarah hopes to build herself a home in the future. She wants to save up so that she can move her family and her business into a place where she will not have to pay rent.