Meals on Wheels in Guguletu

When we first met Bheki Kunene he was a teenager growing up in the township of Guguletu. He had big dreams. He wanted to matriculate from high school, continue his studies and start a creative design agency. The odds were against him.

It would take perseverance to stay in high school, money to continue his education and investment capital to purchase the necessary computer equipment to open his business. Incredibly, 10 years after first meeting Bheki, he has accomplished those goals.

Bheki’s new business, Mindtrix, is up and running. The main room of his two-room flat in Guguletu serves as his bedroom and his office. Like all start-up companies, the first year has not been without challenges. There were cash flow problems, marketing issues and times when there was little work and other times when there were not enough hours in the day.

Recently, Bheki had the opportunity to participate in a business competition, which if he were to win, could be a game changer for his fledgling company. Lacking the money needed to purchase a software program that could have saved Bheki days of work, Bheki worked on the financial projections and budgets by hand. On the day we visited, his workstation was covered with page after page of hand drawn graphs and charts, which would be included in his project.

With 48 hours remaining before the deadline for the competition, Acacia Global paid the $99 USD for the software and had it loaded on Bheki’s computer. Bheki quickly learned the program and transferred all of his handwritten information to the software program, dramatically improving the quality of his submission. Later that day, he text messaged us saying, “Good Lord, I am so grateful for what you did. I just finished my financial assumptions for the full five years with graphs and accurate reports. Thank you, Acacia Global.”

It will be some time before Bheki learns how he has done in the competition. The new software program, however, is one more asset to improve Mindtrix’s likelihood of success. Bheki is already a success story and is positioned to do even more. It just takes perseverance and a little help along with way.