Stell-Row Ventures rebrands, takes on more sophisticated markets

Stell-Row Ventures, an agro allied products company, is repositioning to enlarge its market share and capture more sophisticated markets and customers.  This is in the backdrop of the need to grow Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), which comprise 90% of businesses and employs 75% of labour in Nigeria.

In describing what the company does, Stella Ozemoya, CEO Stell-Row says, “we process groundnut oil, moringa oil, gum Arabic and bio-diesel among others. When we started 7 years ago our products were unbranded, so we sold only to market women. However, we have rebranded the company and repositioned it to capture sophisticated buyers.  In Nigeria, production has been profitable whether large scale or small scale production. The Nigerian Government sincerely advertises for investors on production section both for foreigners and Nigerians. Since this is the case, it’s advisable you go for this production since the demand is high and also can be carried out in large or small scale. This is a good business to do here in Nigeria since the raw materials is available to us.”

The Machines and equipment needed for the production of groundnut oil is readily available locally and easy to install and maintain. The market for groundnut oil in Nigeria is huge, because with a population of over 165 million people use groundnut oil to cook and for industrial processes on daily basis.

Ozemoya stated, “like in every phase of life and business there are opportunities and challenges. Some of the challenges are: Funds; to start a full scale groundnut oil processing business you will need between N10million to N15million, this amount is for land, equipment, machineries, labour, and raw material among others.”

“Licence/government policies; one major challenge for those in the processing and manufacturing business is getting appropriate license and being certified. Although it is very important and mandatory to be certified by NAFDAC, SON etc, getting it can be tiring and burdensome, the unnecessary bureaucracy one has to go through can be frustrating. You spend so much and at the end of the day you still have not got your registration number; it can take up to 1 year or even more. But I would advise the waiting is worth it. Other challenges are transportation and power” she opined.

STEPHEN ONYEKWELU