How social media opened doors for Busingye’s fashion business

One lazy Sunday afternoon, I was scrolling through different Facebook pages when I stumbled across a fashion label called Ambishion.
When I clicked on the page, there were photographs of impressive outfits including African themed designs accompanied with a stream of comments commending the magic hands behind the work.
Brenda Busingye, 36, is the brain behind this fashion brand that has been in operation since December 2015. Her work station is in Ntinda, a Kampala suburb.

How Busingye wound up in fashion
For many years, family members and friends complimented Busingye for her remarkable sense of style. “They would say things such as you look great, you have a nice dress or that is a unique design you are wearing,” she says.
Indeed, she confirms that she is the kind of woman who loves wearing outfits that get everybody talking.

“I do not like to come across another person wearing an outfit similar to mine at an event or on the streets. I hate it,” she says, adding, “For this reason, I always try to find unique designs for myself including having them tailor-made.”
And it was this unique dress code that caught the eye of many. Such praise, in the long run, inspired Busingye to start her own fashion label and her first task was to form a partnership with a tailor.

Starting a business
“What I did was buy a few fabrics, which I took to different tailors to make me a dress. Well, they all did an incredible job. However, I was impressed with the work of one particular tailor. His finishing on the dress was on point. I loved it,” she says.
Busingye requested for a partnership with this man she later came to know as John Bahati.
“I told him about working together. He would utilise his tailoring expertise as I found the clients and made the sketches.”

“John turned me down, reasoning that he was trying to do his own thing,” she says.
Several months later, as Busingye pondered on what to do next, Bahati surprisingly called her saying, “let’s do this and see how it goes.”
“We brainstormed on the place of operation, what kind of machines and fabric to buy and other important aspects of the business,” she says.
Her brother extended a helping hand by giving her one of the rooms in his house for a workstation. Meanwhile, Busingye’s father bought her the first sewing machine.

For their first collection, the duo opted for African fabric because of its beauty and vibrancy. They made a mixture of office, party and casual wear before posting the designs on a Facebook page.
“Wow! Our Facebook page blew up with positive feedback. We were overwhelmed,” she says, adding, “A number of people were calling and looking for me.”
This kind of response propelled Busingye to push forward with the business she later came to call Ambishion.
“My motive was not to make clothes for the runway but rather, for women who love clothes and want to have unique outfits inside their wardrobes,” she says.

Work challenges
During the initial stages of her work, Busingye hardly interfaced with clients.
“I was working at my brother’s home and did not want them coming over to invade his privacy,” she says.
As many continued demanding to have a meeting with her, she decided to look for another workstation.
“I shifted my workplace to Ntinda in April 2016. This is where I am based now,” she says.

Currently, she works alongside a team of four employees who help with making sketches and sewing the outfits. Busingye’s partner Bahati and one of the designer’s sisters are part of this team.
Ordinary outfits including casual wear cost between Shs150, 000 to about Shs250, 000. Bridal outfits are priced differently depending on what designs a client wants.
According to Busingye, the fashion house makes most sales during the festive season, precisely in the month of December.

“Sometimes, we get overwhelming orders and are forced to even hire an extra team of people,” she says.
The other season they receive many clients is the Easter holiday.
There are several challenges the business faces on a day to day basis. For starters, Busingye says getting the right fabrics is not always easy.
“There have been times we want to make particular designs and yet we lack the particular fabrics for making them,” she says.

So, this at times forces Busingye to travel abroad to buy the fabric.
This aside, there is the issue of clients not honouring scheduled appointments.
“You tell someone to come for either measurements or fittings at a particular time and they do not show up or make a phone call informing us why they are not able to come. Such little things interfere with the smooth flow of work,” she says.
Then, there are seasons when work is so slow that Busingye worries about finding money to pay employees and rent. Overall though, Busingye is happy that she is practising her passion.

Before the fashion house
After graduating with a Bachelors degree in Development Studies from Mbarara University of Science and Technology (MUST) in 2004, Busingye worked at then Celtel Uganda in the sales department for a period of about six months.

“I was mostly dealing with customer care service as well as selling phones,” she says.
Later, Busingye got a placement at then Nile Bank as the ATM operations officer.
“I worked at the bank for about four years and part of my job was to ensure all the ATMs of the bank were working at all times, day and night. In case there was a problem, I had to have it fixed,” she says.
It was while at the bank that she realised the need to acquire more education, so she enrolled for a Master’s programme in Human Resource Management at Makerere University Business School (MUBS).

Upon inquiring about the year she graduated, Busingye shyly responds that the graduation did not happen because of failure to finish the research. At the moment, she only has partial results of the exams she sat during the programme.
After Nile Bank, Busingye moved to Simba Telecom as a Human Resource Officer, a position she held for two years. It was during this particular assignment that she realised how difficult it was to balance motherhood and work.

Search for a balanced life
“I remember a time my son was only two months old and I had to leave him behind with the maid. Therefore, it became difficult to breastfeed him at required times. Sometimes I worked long hours and returned home late,” she says.
Busingye thought long and hard of other flexible jobs that would allow her some time with her son.
She got a placement as a business manager with a human resource role at Twinkles Nursery and Day Care Centre in Kiwatule, a suburb of Kampala.

“The main reason I accepted to work at the nursery was to see how it operates and borrow ideas of starting up my own in the near future,” she says, adding,” But I came to realise that setting up nurseries can be expensive, so I dropped the whole idea,” she explains.

She decided to try something different. After discarding the idea of starting up a nursery, she opted to start a school shuttle business. All this, she conceived while working as business manager at the school.
I had my own van and I hired a driver to pick up and drop children from the school,” she says.
Problems started cropping up when the car began to wear down. There was the issue of bad roads which made it difficult for the driver to access some of the homes.

“Maintaining the van became expensive and so, I dropped that idea as well,” she says.
It was right after the shuttle failure that Busingye decided to leave her managerial position in order to start her fashion label.
After many false starts, Busingye had finally found her heart’s desire; a career in fashion and a business driven by the power of social media; the good will of friends and recommendations of happy customers.
As she strives to deliver to her clients’ high standards, Busingye is satisfied that at least, it is all well worth the effort.

Education background
Busingye completed primary school at Mbarara Municipal School. She sat Senior Four exams at Bweranyangi Girls Secondary school, Bushenyi. She finished Senior Six in 1999 at Bugema Adventist Secondary School (BASS) before enrolling at Mbarara University of Science and Technology (MUST) for a Bachelor’s degree in development studies. She graduated in early 2004.

Family life
She is a mother of two boys aged eight years and eight months old. Busingye adds that she is a fitness fanatic who tries to exercise about three times a week. This includes attending dance classes. The 36-year-old also tries to watch what she eats. Rarely does she eat junk or drink soda.
“It is a way of preventing myself from getting a cocktail of diseases when I grow older,” she says.

Busingye’s business tips:-
• Delivering on time is important. However good you are, if you disappoint a client, they will not come back. They will spread the word like a wildfire.
• In this kind of business, it is important to do a lot of research as a way of keeping up with the latest fashion trends. Read many fashion magazines and watch television programmes with a fashion theme.
• If you do not understand the business or lack passion for it, there is a likelihood that it will fail. For your business to succeed, you must love what you do.