“DO NOT waste money when your business is doing well – save or invest it.
“Don’t rush out to buy a fancy car as soon as you have some cash. Spend your money carefully.”
Nokuthula Dladla is the owner of Megaphase in Durban, KZN, which specialises in making road marking and traffic signs.
Megaphase’s success was boosted when it won the Eskom Foundation’s entrepreneur award for manufacturing a few years ago.
While Dladla started small, she has experienced many struggles, so SunMoney asked her for some survival wisdom.
With only a grade 8 education, she struggled to get going.
“I got experience as a marketer in bank and I then studied marketing at Damelin but I failed.
“But everything I learnt there helped me to get where I am today. All failures are lessons. Never stop learning! Embrace any opportunity to learn. If you do, you will go far in your business.”
Dladla favours forming partnerships.
“You might have a great idea but no money for it. Go out and find the person with money to fund your idea and help turn it into something great.”
She said she used to hide her business plan because she feared people would steal it. But that did not help because nobody is willing to help you if they don’t know what you want to do.
“Partnerships are paths to success.”
