Paul Kinuthia is the founder of Interconsumer Products Ltd. He is the brains behind popular consumer products such as Nice & Lovely, All Time Sanitary Pads, Bouncy Baby Diapers, and Golden Shine shoe polish.
Career
Paul Kinuthia is no doubt one of Kenya’s latest entrants into the exclusive club of billionaires.
The businessman first burst onto the national stage four years ago when his company InterConsumer Products won the Business Daily’s TOP100 SMEs competition and captured the imagination of many enterprising Kenyans with his rags-to-riches story.
He was back in the limelight last week when he made a fortune spinning off a section of his company and selling it to global cosmetics giant L’Oreal in a deal estimated to have been worth more than Sh1.5 billion.
Mr Kinuthia wears his success with ease and his demeanour does not betray the stature of a man who has recently entered the coveted club of Kenyan billionaires.
That is perhaps because the picture of his humble origins is permanently affixed in his mind – even as he put pen to paper in what could easily be one of the largest take-over deals in Kenya this year.
Mr Kinuthia’s journey to the world of entrepreneurship began in 1995 in pursuit of what he thought would be a modest source of personal income.
The businessman says the company that he sold last week started with a capital of Sh3,000 he used to buy chemicals to make one of Kenya’s home-grown shampoos.
The backstreet operation was initially located in Nairobi’s downtown Kirinyaga Road before it moved to the city’s Kariobangi and Gikomba areas.
Initially running a one-man operation in which he was the only worker on the ‘factory’ floor and the chief salesman Mr Kinuthia would package his goods and walk from one beauty salon to another, introducing his products to prospective customers and telling them that his unbranded shampoo was just as good as the branded ones they had in stock.
Interconsumer products slowly gained traction but it was not until 2001 that the business broke into the limelight as a major player in Kenya’s cosmetics market.
Clik here to view.
Paul Kinuthia
“We broke even in 2001 and that is when I formalised its operations and hired professionals to help run the show,” he said.
The secret, he says, was right pricing. “Kenya is a price-sensitive market and the mere fact that we were able to supply our customers with quality products at relatively much lower prices did it for us,” Mr Kinuthia said.
“Before long, we were drawn into an all-out marketshare war with the multinationals who had dominated the personal care business for decades,” he said.
Using the combination of guerrilla marketing and low pricing Mr Kinuthia managed to steadily grow his share of the cosmetics market gaining control of 30 per cent of total marketshare in a growth that was mainly driven by his flagship Nice & Lovely brand of shampoo. Interconsumer sold cosmetics worth Sh1.7 billion last year, earning Mr Kinuthia more than Sh200 million in net profits.
That was barely two years after he graduated out of Business Daily’s TOP100 SMEs Club – having crossed the Sh1 billion annual revenue threshold joining the Club 101 of the competition that is run in collaboration with consultancy firm KPMG.
Deal makers said Interconsumer’s large market share and the growing popularity of its brands in the regional market is what caught the eye of the French cosmetics giant L’Oreal.
Video
The post Paul Kinuthia Biography and Wealth appeared first on Kenyan People.