Siblings emerge from father’s shadow with Top 100 bookshop

Educate Yourself managing director Gopal Savani at the firm’s outlet in Westlands. PHOTO | DIANA NGILA 

By SANDRA CHAO-BLASTO, schao@ke.nationmedia.com

Three brothers, Baiju, Kishaan and Golpal are taking their family’s reading culture to the next level with their bookshop.

Nothing out of the ordinary stands out with the three except for their surname, Savani. Their father setup Savani’s Bookshop which has been running in the country for over four decades selling books for students of all ages.

Over the last five years the siblings have worked hard to emerge from their father’s shadow setting up a successful enterprise that was ranked 71st in this year’s Top 100 companies survey.

To differentiate themselves from other players in the market they carved their niche working with schools that provide international curriculum as well as private colleges and universities.

Their main business however comes from the books and resources they import from various countries including  the United Kingdom, the US, and India.

The siblings have shared responsibilities in the company according to their individual strengths and experience within the book industry.

Baiju, the eldest acts as the managing director, Gopal deals with marketing while Kishaan, the youngest is charged with developing new markets for the business, both locally and across Africa.

They bought their first inventory and setup shop at Corner Plaza in Westlands, Nairobi in August 2010. Their premier Educate Yourself store replaced one of the Savani’s Bookshop old outlets.

The siblings took two days of brainstorming before coming up with the name for their business. They have over the years expanded with an outlet at the Greenspan Mall and are looking to open another at the Westgate Mall in a week’s time.

“We have just finished shelving and moving inventory. We chose Westgate since it fits our market niche with its perfect location. It is especially very personal to me because in 2007 I set up a Savani’s branch there.

As much as we were affected by the 2013 terrorist attack we have to move in and continue with our lives,” Gopal said adding that their new store would be much smaller than their father’s bookshop.

Their reason for expansion is quite simple. While there are not many players in the market offering the services they do, their only store at Corner Plaza was not  really a walk- in outlet  whose displays could entice customers into buying.

Economies of scale

Their main business, Gopal explained comes from the books they import which is not limited to quantity as Educate Yourself can ship in a single book that a customer desperately wants to read, although it is much cheaper to order a number of books  due to the economies of scale.

While starting a business without any reputation can be difficult, the brothers had the advantage of their surname and the fact that they were raised in a family that values books.

Like most Asian families where everyone gets involved in the business the brothers initially worked for their father’s bookshops albeit they joined in at different times.

Most of the suppliers they deal with today were acquainted to them before they left their father’s business.

“We import for them all the international stuff and have direct relationship with all the big schools-  Braeburn, Banda, Hillcrest, Aga Khan, Jaffrey’s and  Peponi. That’s our specialty, sourcing anything required from nursery all the way  to university level. It’s not limited to books but also resources that will facilitate learning. The imagination comes from the schools and the supplies from us,” he said.

Besides the aforementioned schools, they have also supplied the United States International University, African Nazarene and Baraton University. They have also supplied to schools in Ghana and  Zambia.

Gopal  said there have been instances where some of their former employees have successfully started bookstores but failed to pay up for their inventory leading to conflicts with some of the suppliers two years down the line.

“While publishers are not allowed to sell to schools directly, we are getting a lot of competition from suppliers in the UK who directly supply to our customers. The only advantage we have over them is that we are in the market and can thus be able to physically interact with the clients and they can directly give us feedback on the challenges they are facing and have one on-one exchanges,” he explained.

One of their direct competitors in is Text Book Centre (TBC) which has numerous branches across the country.

With the talk of digitisation of content within the educational curriculum and the shift from physical to reading off Kindles and tablets, Educate Yourself is positive that this will not affect their sales.

“We have been talking to suppliers in the UK because they are ahead of us in terms of technology and also financially and they say their sales have not dropped greatly. We are not saying this will not happen only that it will not happen right now and all at once,” he elaborated.

When that happens, Gopal said they will also be moving to provide digitised local content of the books they source locally.

For now, they are still weighing the options as to whether to have their website integrated into an e-commerce platform directly selling to customers.