Time to shine

Inner-city Johannesburg is its usual noisy, busy self, and parking is also proving to be hellish, when, out of the blue, a fellow neatly dressed in a corporate suit, courteously extends his hand to the window of my car.

“Hi, my name is Lusanda,” he says, with a heavy Xhosa accent.

This is how I met exciting entrepreneur Lusanda Madinda when arriving to interview him at one of his shoeshine workstations in the Johannesburg CBD.

Madinda owns a unique shoe shining business.

In fact, it is so unique that his employer gave him space at his workplace in which to set up a station and still kept him on as an employee in the IT section, where he is a software test manager.

“I am very grateful to Absa for sharing my vision and believing in me and giving me an opportunity to trade. I don’t think this business would exist if they hadn’t given me the opportunity,” he said.

He refers to the rent-free space the bank offered him in two of its buildings. He now provides his shoe-shining services for the bank’s employees.

The two-year-old business is a mobile shoeshine experience that also offers shoe repairs for all types of shoes, including ladies’, and suede cleaning.

Most of his clients are his corporate colleagues and bosses.

“Most of the people in corporate don’t have much time.

"In between meetings we can give you a shoeshine experience and, with ladies, if a heel comes off we can quickly fix it for you before your next meeting.

"We provide an executive shoeshine experience to our clients. When we cater for events, people will never forget that event. People love it,” he said with excitement.

Already employing four people to run the day-to-day business of shining people’s shoes, Madinda Shoeshine [the name of the business] is more than a typical shoeshine station, Madinda said.

“I started at Absa in 2012. I followed the rules and policies and ensured that this business does not conflict with Absa,” he said, adding that he modelled the business in such a way that he did not need to be there to ensure successful sustainability.

Besides Absa, he has a similar rent-free deal with property giant Growthpoint.

At one of his busier stations in downtown Johannesburg, which City Press visited, Madinda demonstrated his idea of executive treatment: a comfortable leather couch with a foot rest; a coat rack to hang coats and jackets; and speedy service.

Born in the Cape Town township of Gugulethu, Madinda’s entrepreneurial drive has included some business failures.

But he believes those experiences helped him prepare for success.

“A lot of research went into this. We use the best products only and that is why we even signed a enterprise development programme with Kiwi [shoe care product company] and it brought much-needed financial support and even gave us business at their events,” he said.

According to the entrepreneur, the end game for now is consolidating the business in the province through the corporate stations and events.

He currently has four stations, including one in Sandton, and has plans to extend the service to malls.

Madinda moved to Gauteng five years ago to join Absa, and resides in Alberton on the East Rand.

He seemed a bit sceptical about taking the model, in its current state, to the township.

“In the township market, there may be shoe repair services, but this business is about convenience more than anything else. People don’t have time for these things and we take care of any type of shoe,” he said.

The business has managed to cater for a number of prominent events, has professionalised well and even has a website.