Disaster Creates Opportunities

Valley of Desolation, Camdeboo National Park (Source: www.southafrica.net)

I really believe the best online businesses that will be the big names within the next 5 years are probably business ideas or concepts that no-one has even thought of up till now. As new situations arise and develop, and things happen that have never happened before, entire new industries will develop (at one time the internet was an “event” that had never happened before and now some of us depend on it for our livelihoods).There have been some amazing ideas even in South Africa that have sprung up.

Businesses can happen out of situations of great distress. For example, the AIDS epidemic in Southern Africa has (sadly) been a massive source of prosperity for new (and old) businesses in South Africa. Some of the “old” business ideas have been the funeral parlours. AVBOB is probably the best known of them, established in Bloemfontein in 1921, it is probably a little known fact that the company is now one of the most successful in South Africa, with net income in the tax year 2011/12 posted at R820million (an increase from R456,6million in the previous year) whilst total assets increased over the same period by 19.5% to R6.2billion (see Chairman’s Report). I was actually shocked by these figures, particularly the increase year on year which indicates that the AIDS pandemic is far from being “under control” which our Government is very quiet about. I cannot imagine another reason for the doubling in turnover of a funeral service business, since South Africa has not had a sudden outbreak of War or other major catastrophe. Scary.

Another business in South Africa which was probably much needed previously, but became a viable business as a result of the sheer numbers of deaths due to the AIDS pandemic. I heard (from a reliable source, I once interviewed the Founder's Personal Assistant many years ago when she was looking for a career move!) this business was started as a result of a conversation between two people in a pub. One of them had a relative who’d passed away (around 1998) and was lamenting that he needed to repatriate the body to another country bordering South Africa for a burial according to local traditions but was struggling with the logistics, being unable to find anyone who could help. This birthed a new business where the founder secured deals with all the local insurance companies providing insurance policies, and started the first specialized business handling all the logistics for people who needed this service. It is a thriving business with its head office in Midrand, 21^st Century Life, now with 25 branches across the country.

If you don’t ask, you won’t receive: Ask God for a new business idea, but when you get it, don’t speak about it: ACT swiftly and DO it!