Home ›› 14 Aug 2021 ›› News
Every remarkable venture begins more or less with a small step while there are entrepreneurs who make fortune out of their sheer commitment and hard work, thereby making a big name in the business arena overcoming limitations.
Of them Rezbin Hafiz is a household name who has made a mark as a female entrepreneur in her footwear business.
A noted teacher-turned businesswoman has clearly shown that no barrier can knock one out as long as one has tremendous vigour and a sound business idea.
Born and brought up completely in a rustic surrounding, she had indomitable spirit to overcome her middle-class family status as well as to do something for hundreds of destitute individuals who are victims of natural calamities such as river erosion.
“I was on the right track as a teacher at Bepza Public School and College and Milestone School and College where I spent some 10 years till December 2015, but something slowly dawned on me,” said Rezbin.
According to the female entrepreneur, following her marriage with a leather engineer husband, she just kept thinking out of the box and wanted to do something anew and dreamed to be a businesswoman.
“It was like breaking the traditional mould of my family that preferred my teaching job to anything else,” she said.
While narrating her experience, Rezbin stated how she struggled to find a footing in the field of business. Sensing a big potential in footwear trade, she left her decade-long teaching job and turned to entrepreneurship that resulted in fruition within a few months.
Since the start,the female entrepreneur began to face a multitude of problems. Her attempts at entering leather factories in the city’s Hazaribagh, Bangshal, Savar and Ashulia to gain business knowledge went in smoke.
Rezbin recalled how many times she was refused entry to the leather factories by the security personnel, but she was undaunted by the enormity of her courage and her clear-cut goal.
Sharing her preliminary step into the business with this correspondent, the business women maintained that it was like moving mountain to somehow start a steel die cutting business primarily with a small investment of Tk 3.5 lakh at a 500-square feet location at Jirabo in Ashulia where she had only two hands to work for her venture.
A completely laborious job – designing, cutting, knitting and sewing according to respective dice– that continued from early morning to midnight and that she did with utmost devotion and sincerity.
The initial ordeal did not end there. At the very outset, the businesswoman had to move from market to market to purchase raw material at cheap rate and also from factory to factory to get work order locally which was really wearisome, but she did not back down.
Many leather factories in Hazaribagh and Bangshal were reluctant to sell raw materials to a small client like her who could hardly manage to hire a pick-up van to carry the basic materials to her workplace.
During her maiden journey, Rezbin’s landlord was also hostile to her. He even went to the extent of setting a private detective against her since she had to return home late particularly with the heaps of raw materials for her manufacturing products.
The leather items used to be retailed to hawkers as well as to some shops in Ashulia, Tongi and Dhaka.
“I remember once I sold 700 pairs of shoes in a capital fair. Besides, slippers, sandals, belts, executive bags, money bags, backpacks, purses, wallets, table gift boxes and jackets were sold out like hotcake,” she stated.
An MA in Leather Technology and an MBA in Marketing, Rezbin was up and doing her best to achieve a theoretical knowhow to run her business successfully.
“I took my training on how to improve entrepreneurship under Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) Foundation in 2015 and later from Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation,”she added.
The year of 2014 brought her fortune when many enterprises including Bata subcontracted their work to Rezbin following her product reputation.
In Fiscal Year 2016-17, she established two manufacturing units on the outskirts of the capital with a cumulative floor space of 8000 square feet and 3500square feet where 320 people are involved in manufacturing process.
“Now my daily manufacturing capacity is over 1,000 pairs of shoes and 500 pairs of sandals besides other products – all are provided to local shops, wholesalers and subcontractors like Bata, Apex, Aarong, Royal, Jeal and Orion,” said the business icon.
Many of her products are also being exported to several countries including China, Japan, Malaysia and India.
Rezbin Hafiz is now a cult figure who owns Peoples Footwear and Leather Goods and PLG Leather Training Centre in Ashulia. Her firms’ have a yearly turnover above Tk200 crore.
The entrepreneur said her achievement of National SME Award 2020 under Micro-entrepreneur category made a paradigm shift to all antagonistic thoughts surrounding her.
The recognition brought her fame and fortune and made her an icon in the arena of women entrepreneurship.
From 2020 onward, Rezbin has been on a triumphant march, expanding her business and changing the lot of a large segment of people living below the poverty line.
In Gaibandha BSCIC (Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation) area, a 900-square-feet factory of hers is hiring the ultra-poor including Santal men, widows and divorced women. While sharing her experience with this correspondent, Rezbin underscored the need for willpower to overcome all obstacles including negation and offensiveness that come in the way of a successful trajectory.
In reply to a query, Rezbin said there were times when she had pulled herself through ups and downs.
“I incurred losses when some vested interests used to sell my products after their brand names,
and there was a time when my factory production nosedived after one of my employees conspired against me and took away all 17 workers from the factory,” she added.
Asked for advices to the would-be entrepreneurs, the entrepreneurial icon said there is no alternation to hard work and determination, and most importantly following one’s passion.
In addition, one has to be tech-savvy with sufficient knowledge about the whole business processes that would pave the way for a good career, concluded Rezbin.
