There are some successful Commercial Garri Processors that I know today, who started their venture into this business by firstly establishing their routes to market.
They simply identify one of two processors of quality garri (local or commercial), off take from them as middlemen at good prices and gradually build their own market or customer base.
Eventually, it is the size of their market base that naturally call for the establishment of their own processing facilities. And with access to good market being an integral part of any business, these set of Investors hardly go wrong.
When the market has been established, the next critical area is how to establish a production and operational system that will guarantee outputting of quality garri and good marketable price, which part of it the siting the processing facility in an area where there is abundant supply of cassava tubers at good price for profitable garri production. And another is putting in place basic and necessary equipment to guarantee effective and efficient production system.
After all these, managing the operation of the facility for optimum production at controlled cost to guarantee profitability is another major challenge that Investors in Commercial Garri Processing usually encounter. This particular area of the business require special attention especially if you are going to be running the factory on manual frying. If not well managed, the combination of cost of manual frying, firewood and other related costs on frying is enough to make the entire operation come into a complete loss.
One of the proven Operational Management templates that works so well in this aspect is JOINT OPERATION of the the processing facility with one or two existing local processors in that locality. I have once elaborated how I tactically switched to this scheme when I newly started operation at Kajola. Simply, this is about costs and benefit sharing with the co – operators.
In their respective batch production, you give them the liberty to handle negotiation and purchases of materials to a certain extent. Also the freedom to engage and negotiate payment with support hands they use especially on peeling and unit operations.
While you put up the management and control structure that oversees the entire operation, your co – operators are the one directly in charge of their individual batch production.
You fund the operation from beginning to the end. At the end of everything, you will offtake the entire production output at the prevailing selling price in that area. From the proceeds, you firstly deduct all the total amount you have expended in sponsoring that particular batch production and the balance is shared into three equal parts. One for you as the business owner, one for your co – operator as his or her own gain from that production batch and the third part belongs to the facility; to take care of maintenance and savings against depreciation.
The idea behind this is that the sense of belonging and partial ownership shsring you have extended to the co – operator will force him/her to do the best of cost control in procurement of materials and payment of workers; since he/she is aware that the eventual profit or loss would be mutually shared. This is when you see them doing more of the activities that would have added to the operational cost by themselves.
You get supplies of tubers at comparatively reduce cost. Same with firewoods. As long as you continue to motivate and encourage them with other incentives like equal access to the cassava peels and garri lumps, the operation will continue to run smoothly. You will continue to get regular good quality garri for your established customers at good price, you will continue to make profit from the production facility you have set up and your partners will also continue to make good returns. It is a win-win for everyone.
While this operational template gives the business owner some extent of freedom to attend to other things, it is important to put in place control measures to prevent pilfering or possible overloading of expenses, beyond only playing only oversight responsibility. It is essential that the business owner have good idea quantity valuation and costings. As a person, I can estimate to near accuracy how many bags of finished garri to produced from a certain quantity of raw cassava tuber or grated and pressed bags of cassava mash. And the moment you have a sniff of any foul practice, you know what next to do. The business owner needs to always wear his thinking cap to continuously put in place measures to guide his/her interest in this scheme, which could be exploited against him/her because of its flexibility.
Like every other business, beyond what we are merely observing from afar, there is a lot to learn; especially from the economic angles when venturing into Commercial Garri Processing Business and this should not be taken for granted.
God no go shame us.
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