Visit to Diourbel and Thiés

Today, we paid a visit to the women GIE based in Diourbel and Deendey couture to discuss products that WOW will probably neeed, particularly bracelets and bags. for that occasion, we invited Seni from Entreprise Bracelets because she was working in partnership with that GIE.
We left the office at 7o'clock am to attain Diourbel around 10o'clock.Once there we discussed the products we were asking for, they had exhited some samples of bracelets with many different designes and colours. At end of our discussion, they agreed to make us bracelets with a suitable design and according to the Wow main colours... we also asked to make some bracelets mixing these colours.
We left there at midday and called on Dendey couture. We got to thiès around 1o'clock p.m, finding Mouminou, the Dendey couture owner a bit ill. After salamecs, we explained her the reason for our visit. She made us certain she would be able to make bags according to our needs and wants.But unfortunately, she hadn't any sample of bay because it was not her main product. She promised to call us soon to give the right prices and costs related to the bags producing.
After taking lunch, we left there to attain at 6o'clock p.m. Seni ensured us she would to the office on friday bringing necklaces.
Amara

Feasibility Considerations

After a long and productive talk with Linda yesterday the team was busy at work today on two important tasks: a plan for the anticipated WOW Business Center and staffing considerations for the next 6 months. We were asked to steer our efforts to these areas after having encountered some difficulty performing a feasibility study for one WOW’s portfolio companies, Benn Loxo in the city of Joal.

Because we spent a fair amount of time preparing this feasibility study – and we believe these kind of studies should increasingly provide the foundation for WOW’s due diligence process – I thought I would touch on this a bit in this blog post. Benn Loxo is a women’s cooperative that processes a diversity of seafood products native to the Joal region. These include a variety of fish and shellfish that are dried, salted and smoked through artisanal methods. The waters around Joal are among the most fish-abundant in West Africa and this draws considerable attention from local and international traders. Women have traditionally processed and traded these products, but because they are rarely organized into cooperatives they tend to be exploited by outside buyers who at times force them to sell their products for as little as 100 CFA/kilo ($0.25/kilo). Benn Loxo – which means “one arm” in Wolof – was begun to strengthen the ability of Joal’s women to collectively bargain with buyers and generate better returns on their labor. At 157 members strong, the cooperative has the potential to do just that.

Recently the cooperative’s founder Fatoumata Ndiaye Lo provided WOW with an urgent funding request for 3 million CFA (approximately $7,500) to provide working capital to take advantage of the brief and lucrative octopus fishing season. While their concept was reasonable, WOW couldn’t act on it as quickly as Benn Loxo required because they were unable to provide any proof that this endeavor would be financially successful. Beyond this short-term project the cooperative has more ambitious plans to set up a central fish processing facility where the women could work as an organized unit (as opposed to their current loosely-organized structure), but have been unable to show that their objectives are attainable or feasible. This is in fact an obstacle to many of WOW’s portfolio companies, one that we are working hard to remedy. For this reason we took the initiative to prepare a feasibility study for Benn Loxo, but after speaking with Fatoumata it became clear that the cooperative was still in their preparatory stages and could not provide all of the necessary information to perform such a study.

Benn Loxo is not alone in its urgent requests for funding. One of WOW’s best organized and most promising portfolio companies – Marché.com – is seeking working capital to expand its operations and has good plan to carry this out. However, as our colleague Malick puts it, “these considerations are not simple,” and as WOW’s principle investment analyst he knows better than most. Malick explained that before WOW can disburse a new round of funding we need to put a new and better system in place to allow us to efficiently and responsibly respond to each requests. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, this is one of the responsibilities that the Summer Interns have taken on and we hope to make a solid contribution to such systems before the summer is out! Until next time,

~Christian

Meeting with Ludo for the website implementation

As per guidance from Linda, we kicked off work on the WOW Investments website. Ludo came to the WOW office and we had a three hour meeting with him during which we discussed various topics
- The layout of the website. We provided him with a detailed document which could potentially act as his site map as he begins designing.
- Website colors. We asked Ludo to work with the three WOW colours as the base; with blue being the potential focus for WOW investments. Linda sent us documents that have the three different color palettes – each focusing on either blue, orange or pink. We forwarded this to Ludo.
- Interactive and engaging website. We talked with Ludo about how we want the website to be interactive and engaging. This could be done by blogs, photographs, videos and allowing users to possibly add content as well. So that the website can ‘connect’ with those that have not been to Senegal, we explained that we would like to use a lot of images and pictures. Linda sent us pics from her previous visits to Senegal. Ludo will get back to us if the quality of the images is sufficient for the website.
- Using flash or not. Ludo explained the disadvantages of using Flash and how the Google crawler can have difficulties finding keywords. We told him that we will discuss this further with Linda and get back to him.
All in all, the meeting was very successful and we were able to make good progress. We will give him the green flag soon to start building sample pages for us and the US advisors to give feedback on.
Linda is going to discuss the website further with Caroline and get back to use regarding domain names we own and content for the different pages.
Karishma

Thursday at the office...

The team has decided to stay at the office and there were neither meeting nor visit on our daily program. We have planned to think about the WOW next steps and one of the most important points we discussed today were the website. As far as I am concerned, I focused on the Mountaga Tall business plan because Sadio, the CEO has called in the morning, saying she would need it the afternoon. She finally come and recover it around midday. After that, we spent most of our time on drafting the way we should work it out.

Linda called in the afternoon and we have all discussed and agreed on some parts of the design and the content of the website. We have planned to meet Ludovic Lima, the computer scientist who is in charge to set up our website tmorrow at 10 o'clock am.

Amara

Visit to Tissafric

We have decided today to pay a visit for the first time to Tissafric, a company specialized in woven fabrics. Tissafric makes up the WOW new company fortofolio. That is special for Karishma because it is her first company visit.

We went there in the morning and we have had a two hours meeting with the CEO Mrs Traoré. She exposed us the company needs in term of financing and her expectations from WOW activities. She made us know all problems that is encountering Tissafric and how she is planning to work with WOW.

In the afternoon, Linda has called at office so as to make sure we are at the level of comprehension. We have also finalize things we have to do for next days. She said she would call again tomorrow to give some directions to work out the WOW website.

Amara

New team, new challenges

Today is a particular day for us and the office is a bit empty. Laurent and Sachiko left Dakar on Friday, Rose and Aicha must go abroad to carry on with their studies and now it just remains Malick, Christian and I. But fortunately, a new trainee has joined us. Her name is Karishma BAIJAL and she come from India but is studying in US.

We are preparing our last meeting with Linda bacause she is leaving today. And it seems to be very important to know what to do for the next months.

She finally arrive at the WOW office around 12 o'clock. After two hours meeting, she left to prepare her trip. But before leaving, she has defined some goals that will be listed below:

- the elaboration of a web site

- the creation of a business center

-the development of company portofolio

And she wants us to thing about the human ressources that will be needed and the WOW products to develop.

these are the new goals that the new team we have to achieve.

Amara

OUR INTERSHIP END

The morning is a bit difficult today after a very full day yesterday and we arrive at the office late.
There is not fortunately lot of work and we have already finished the company reports and proposed due diligences to WOW. We felt we have already honored our contract. We didn't plan to meet Linda today and she seemed to very busy. Besides, she has gone to ASNAP (an agency specialized in community development) with Christian to try and built a partnership.
After having lunch, Rose, Aicha and I got to Oxfam GB in order to receive the rest of our wage.
At our return to the office, we have finalized the remaining work.
We finally left round 6 o'clock pm, wishing Laurent and Sachiko a nice trip. They are going to leave tomorrow.
So, this is the end of our 45 days internship.
Amara