August 29, 2026
I recently read an inspiring story in the social media – where else these days. It was about a young man who read Accountancy in the university. And because he was good with figures, he had assumed he would get a good job in a bank after graduation. He was wrong and it took several application letters for him to realise the banks were not exactly queueing up to offer him a job. Rather than moan about the system like many do these days, he took a clerical job in an uncle’s retail shop. It was there he learnt a lesson that was to change his outlook to life. He found salary earners asking for goods on credit until month-end.
Maybe his ability to crunch numbers helped him, but he realized it was a debt trap; a hole that many of them might not be able to dig themselves out of. It made him realise that the much coveted salaried jobs could hardly make any earner rich. He resigned and took his fate in his hands like most entrepreneurs do. He took up a job as night security so he could free his day. He set up a barbing salon. After a while, with discipline and self-denial, he was able to buy a small generator to further grow his business. When he felt he had built up some capital, he went to trading and retailing which his mother had always done and from whom he had learnt the rudiments of the retail business before honing them with his uncle. As the business grew, he decided to pool resources with the uncle under whom he had earlier worked. Together, they own about the largest chain of indigenous supermarkets in the country today. No prize for getting the name of the man with such an inspiring, rags-to-riches story. His name is emblazoned on big Supermarkets in Lagos, Abuja and elsewhere.
