Alex Rose-Innes
Ask any female about a constant negative in their lives and young women will say menstruation pain while older women would bemoan menopause. Undergoing the “change” as it is referred to saw Regina Nakayenga’s natural hibiscus products enter the health market.
When Regina started experiencing those dreaded hot flushes of menopause, a friend suggested hibiscus products. Nakayenga, an enthusiastic farmer and grower of passion fruit which she was selling in concentrated form, was already searching for organic preservatives to secure a long shelf life for her passion fruit drink products.
Always searching for new and greener ways of doing business and improving the health of people in her home country of Uganda, she followed up on her friend’s suggestion. When her menopause symptoms improved after using hibiscus derivatives, this entrepreneur knew she had a winning product.
Rena Beverage Solutions was established in 2010 and not only did she find a natural health product in the hibiscus plant, but it also became the mainstay of her beverage products. Among her many extremely popular drinks are hibiscus wine and juice.
However, Regina is not focusing on this popular market alone, but is aggressively targeting the growing global health-conscious market. In Uganda, women who suffer from high blood pressure and female students who used to miss school because of the severity of monthly menstrual cramps, had seen their health situations drastically change with the use of hibiscus powder. Her products are now selling like the proverbial hot cakes in Uganda’s health centres, pharmacies, supermarkets and even restaurants.
The growth in demand saw Regina’s revenue substantially increase over the past years, generating USD 7 000 per month (almost R103 000). Rena Beverage Solutions now also sells okra and palm seed coffees and rosemary. To keep up with demand for her natural products, Regina has more than 400 Ugandan smallholder farmers supplying her factory with hibiscus calyces, ensuring a sustainable income for them as well. She invests time and money into teaching these farmers how to grow the best possible crops and improve their harvest by using available technology. The machines at the Rena Beverage Solutions factory were financed by internal revenue.
After winning the African Entrepreneurship Award in 2019, the company obtained a substantial loan to acquire a hibiscus tea bag machine which would see Regina’s post-COVID profits increase even further.
The natural health market had become a fiercely competitive environment with large international brands such as Coca-Cola and Pepsi joining the trend towards organic products. Regina said that Ugandans are still of the mind-set that local products are not as good as imported goods.
Another challenge is that domestic manufacturers are battling with costs and regular availability of electricity, while global producers have sufficient financial means to branch out. In Uganda, as in most African countries, the cost and regular availability of electricity is a major hurdle to overcome. Lack of transport and distributors to create a sustainable supply chain are major issues in Third-World countries making it difficult to compete on even footing with international brands.
But, with the inherent African ability to find solutions to problems, there is no doubt that Regina’s Rena Beverage Solutions would become a well-known and trusted brand, bringing relief to women across the globe while successfully branching out into other markets and supporting her fellowmen.
