She turned her baby Crib into a Premium Furniture Brand |Paradis Nishimwe|Rwanda Edition

We had a season where our products, literally after doing proper cost control, we realized we were losing 70%.

70%.

Can you imagine nearly doubling our prices?

On the next episode of Financially Incorrect, Rwanda Edition, we speak to Paradis Nishimwe, the founder of Wood Habitat.

an Afro-centric interior design and furniture company based in Kigali.

They're a lifestyle brand serving Rwanda and the world passionate about creating spaces for living and loving.

She tells us about a bike ride and a prophecy her grandfather makes early in her life.

He hands me like a brand new note of 1,000 random francs.

It was like $2, right? He looks at me and says, I always knew that you were so rich.

You will own banks.

I remember him saying, yeah, like he will own banks.

Like that was his way of saying you'll be super wealthy.

She starts Wood Habitat at 21 while pregnant, starting by designing a baby crib.

I designed the first baby crib.

I went to the wood market.

I went there, designed it, and we started from there.

And then one thing led to another.

Here we are, you know, delivering lifestyle hotels and a big team.

And then I started just me.

She talks about getting screwed over by carpenters.

i'm asking him how dare you did this i trusted you i really gave you all my savings then he goes because i cannot refund you please take all this furniture find myself with a bunch of furniture that i didn't even order for

she tells us why her return and refund policy was so important to her

The first thing I told anybody before they paid me, look at me in the eyes.

If you end up liking what you bought, please return everything and your 100%.

And I think that to me has been the biggest leverage.

She was struggling with meeting quality consistently, failing clients 80% of the time.

The first four or five years,

Yes.

Eight out of the ten pieces of financial capital are being returned.

Huge losses.

So how is the business

surviving?

Man, the business, first of all, was burning me down.

Owing her landlord 12 months of rent and being $30,000 in debt.

I remember it was $30,000 in debt.

at a thousand dollars

yes but man that felt like a death sentence

initially she sells 33 of her company to save herself and she tells us what this capital injection allowed her to do

my mentor finds me a guy to buy equity underpriced equity super underpriced the way it saved my business and my life what did that

money allow you to do

First of all, to sleep at night.

Wood Habitat are on a mission to plant and maintain 30,000 trees by 2030.

This is their money story.