You can always tell a woman of class from her bag. Women proudly display their designers’ bags and accessories, to whoever cares to look. In the past, Gucci, Versace, Louis Vuitton, among other foreign based designers dominated the women accessories market. African women spend fortunes to acquire these materials, to impress or oppress and stand out at social gatherings. Little time is paid to homemade women’s accessories, which more often than not are considered as being of inferior quality to foreign made designers materials. This attitude of course, leads to capital flights, under-developed economy, under-utilized raw materials and over-dependence on everything western. One woman has decided to change all that, by daring to re-invent made-in Nigerian women’s bags!
Femi Olayebi, founder of ‘My World of Bags and Femi Handbags, a luxury, bespoke and handcrafted handbag brand, is a Nigerian entrepreneur with a mind for creating the uncommon, top-of-the range handbags that every woman, both African and non-African, would be proud to own. Femi’s bags are not only of superior quality, as they are made with the best quality leader materials from Nigeria. Her bags are handcrafted and tailored to specific needs of her clients.
Femi Olayebi, had a bachelor’s degree in French from the University of Ibadan, and in pursuit of her dream of becoming a translator, followed up with a study at Institute de Traducteurs et d’Interpretes in Strasbourg, France translator. She worked briefly as a freelance translator for several international organizations, including ECOWAS.
Her entrepreneurial journey, which started about 27 years ago at a small room in her home at Ibadan, the capital of Oyo state, South West Nigeria, with just herself and later a tailor, is as interesting and classic as her beautifully crafted handbags. According to Femi, her journey into the uncertain world of entrepreneurship in Nigeria, started by accident. She had gone shopping for her first baby, only to discover that the bags she saw on display were not only ridiculously expensive for her, but she couldn’t find the one that struck her liking from all the bags on display. She then decided to make her own bags at home. Amazingly, her home-made, hand-crafted bag became an instant sensation, among her friends who hardly believed she actually made it. Orders began to pour in from among her friends for her home-made bags, and in that moment, as is the case with those with a streak of entrepreneurship, she knew that a new business was in the offing. Naturally, she decided to register a company, and a new enterprise was born.
One of Femi’s success trademarks, according to her, is her attention to details in the selection of materials, design and sewing of the Femi brand of handbags. Also, her love for colours and textures drove her into experimenting with a variety of materials, which led her into experimenting with ‘Aso-Oke’ materials, a hand-loomed, vibrantly coloured cloth used mostly for head gears, by Yorubas in South West Nigeria. According to Femi, her winning strategy is ‘her uncanny ability to combine modern, sophisticated design elements and silhouettes with an undeniably African touch, by subtly weaving our (African) culture into our products, through the use of traditional fabrics, accessories and hand-stitching techniques.’ Success followed in quick successions.
Femi Handbags, are not your everyday handbags imported from China, which littered the streets of Lagos. Femi bags are products of passion, precision and uncommon commitment to promoting the African indigenous brand to the global marketplace, and thus, helping in putting Nigeria and indeed Africa’s indigenous craft on the world stage, and staking her claim that Africans are makers of best quality handbags, which could stand shoulder to shoulder with other more established brands, which the African women would be proud to adorn.
According to Femi, ‘everything I know about bag-making was self-taught’, and she in turn employed dressmakers whom she turned into bagmakers, by also, according to her, teaching them everything she taught herself.
Femi, who sees herself as an ‘accidental entrepreneur’ since according to her, nothing in her background prepared her to take on that role. Her father was a Professor of Classical Philosophy, and her mother, a primary school teacher. Her initial ambition was to be a translator. But in a country where the job of translation is few and far between, Femi kick started her career as a business owner in her room, but later converted her garage into her first handbag-manufacturing factory. But selling her bags in the Nigerian market, where potential clients were used to patronizing foreign-made handbags, was a huge challenge.
She overcame this huddle by diversifying her product offering into corporate items, while gradually building her customer base. Luckily for her, she had a handful of expatriates, who better appreciated the value of ‘hand-made’ products that she offered. With their support, Femi gradually expanded her product offering, building her brand in the process.
Recognition of her efforts came in the year 2008, when she received the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women scholarship, enabling her to acquire much needed entrepreneurial skills. More doors began to open, as she was also nominated by the Head of Corporate Engagement of Goldman Sachs, to participate in the joint ‘Fortune 500, Vital Voices and Most Powerful Women in America Mentoring Programme’, in New York. While there, she job-shadowed Lauren Merkin, an American handbag designer. This opportunity enabled her to work in American bag making factory, during when she also visited the headquarters of Marc Jacobs.
Femi restructured her company in 2010, by distinguishing the leather bags and accessories line from her corporate line of products, and named the lather bags and accessories after herself. Same year, she participated in her first foreign exhibition, the Autumn/Winter edition of PURE LONDON, which is London’s premier accessories show, to showcase her line of leather handbags. Her products were also on displayed at the 2012 Olympics. The following year, Femi was selected to participate at the African Women’s Entrepreneurship Programme (AWEP), which took place in Chicago, New Mexico and Washington. Her ‘My World of Bags’, was in 2013, selected by Bank of Industry to represent Nigeria at the Nigeria-Brazil Business Forum, in Rio de Janeiro.
Femi is actively involved in mentoring young startups, and world-be entrepreneurs and believes that building an authentically African handbag brand, is what ultimately makes her adventure in the world of creative entrepreneurship worthwhile. Her most important advice to world-be entrepreneurs is to be yourself, be patient and persevere in adversity, connect with people, do things differently by pushing the boundary and never stop learning.
