How I weaved heritage, passion and knowledge to create a luxury beauty brand for Africans.

“Whenever I hear someone saying, “I love entrepreneurship”, I always give them a side eye” this was the sentiment when Linda and I did a debrief after the IG LIVE conversation I had with her on Wednesday, 22 July at 6pm SAST.

I was drawn to interview Linda after I saw her product on Instagram. I loved the packaging, the logo font and the range in the offering. I had no idea of the depth of the brand story and the grounded energy that later drew me to the Suki Suki Natural’s founder.

Linda Gieskes Mwamba - Founder, Suki Suki Naturals

Linda Gieskes Mwamba - Founder, Suki Suki Naturals

Linda Gieskes Mwamba was born in the Democratic Republic of Congo but grew up between Brussels and South Africa. The self-confessed beauty junkie grew up in a family of entrepreneurs with her dad being the President of the National Football Team and her grandfather being the first black man to own a factory in Congo and her grandmother being a seamstress amongst having other business ventures.  The family eventually came to Johannesburg after the second war broke out in DRC in 1997.

I was curious about where she acquired her knowledge for natural ingredients and like most beauty entrepreneurs, she found her secret formula experimenting with different ingredients in the kitchen and testing the products on her own her.

In this interview, we spoke about:

1.     How to collaborate with formulators who can enhance your products and the ownership of your formulas.

2.     The importance of building a strong brand.

3.     Her love for African ingredients in beauty products.

4.     How to focus on the quality and integrity of a few products at the beginning of your business journey.

5.     The amount of money she needed to start her business.

6.     Her transition from law to full time beauty entrepreneur.

7.     How she came up with the brand name SUKI SUKI.

8.     The biggest challenge she has confronted as an entrepreneur.

9.     The reason she decided to scale up her business and venture into skincare.

10.  Her challenges with impostor syndrome and how she overcame it.

ConversationsNomndeni MdakhiBeauty Entrepreneur1 Comment