When Kholofelo Nengwenda (28) moved from Limpopo to start a job in Mpumalanga four years ago, she struggled to find a domestic worker. This motivated her to start a cleaning service and a domestic worker placement company called Mukhoni Cleaning Specialists.
She said her company has grown to create jobs for about 50 people in just a few years of operation.
“Soon after registering my company the demand became so high that I ended up resigning as a school teacher,” she said.
“In the beginning, the business focused more on household cleaning services and domestic worker placement, but two years later we had to expand our services to the commercial and industrial market too,” she added.
In 2016, Nengwenda attended entrepreneurial training at the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA), which empowered her as a business woman.
While she was still attending training, she learned that the NYDA had a grant programme for budding entrepreneurs and she applied for it.
“I specifically applied for grants to purchase equipment for my business because after winning a tender to provide services for the South African Revenue Services (SARS), we struggled to reach windows that were up high on the building,” she said.
“The application process took about a year. I received an amount of about R49 000 grant from the NYDA in 2017 to buy equipment for my company. This helped my business to advance because we were able to provide services at SARS and the Steve Tshwete Municipality in the past year,” she added.
Her company recently expanded its services adding office cleaning, commercial and industrial cleaning to its list.
Among the 50 workers employed by Nengwenda, 35 are permanent. Her company has also made it possible for close to 20 household domestic workers to be placed.
She said her future plans are to grow the business. “I would like to expand my services into training cleaners in the hygiene field and also to become a business improvement coach or a business mentor at the NYDA,” she said.
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