05 Apr 2016

White Angels, one of the few gender affairs assisted companies in Molepolole, is still going strong with prospects of success.

Upon inception in 2009, the founders of the company being five ladies, never looked back despite hurdles they encountered in launching a unique product line. Within the same year, the women registered Dream Flavours a yoghurt manufacturing business.

Rare as it was, the women displayed boldness and went ahead to do their research. One of the directors of White Angels, Ms Chedza Nkhwa explained that when they applied for funding at the Department of Gender Affairs, they wanted to pursue a unique idea and turn it into business. That is how the concept of yoghurt making was formed.

She also highlighted that they realised that all the yoghurt in Botswana was imported from South Africa, hence deciding that they bridge that gap.

Dream Flavours was funded at the tune of P271 000 by gender affairs department, a far cry from what was needed to kick start the project. The project at inception needed more than P500 000. Determined as they were, the five women dug deeper into their pockets to raise part of the money for the project. They used the money to buy basic equipment and started the business.

In 2013, the department of Gender Affairs offered them another 170 000 to expand the business. Dream Flavours yoghurt is now doing well even though there are plans for expansion funds permitting. The yoghurt is sold in some of the major hotels in Gaborone and Francistown. Some of their customers among them are Grandpalm, Masa square, Tlotlo conference.

Although their capacity is still small, the yoghurt has been well received in the market as it has a unique creamy taste. As the demand is growing, Nkhwa says that they want to increase their incubator from 200 litres to 600 litres.

At the moment, they use about 12 000 litres of milk per week to make the yoghurt and sour milk. While there are reports on shortage of milk in this country, Nkhwa says that, sourcing milk has never posed a challenge as they have a reliable supplier in Pitsane.

Of course she acknowledges that the main challenges in this business is sourcing raw materials as they import almost all their materials such as dry ingredients and packaging material from South Africa. This can be a problem especially when they have more orders than expected and acquiring raw materials can take long.

Dream Flavours products are marketed in local trade fairs and through word of mouth. The ladies have won some awards at the Women’s expo exhibition show in the category of food processing. The ladies hail LEA for their support as well as training them in different aspects of the business. In the meantime they are pursuing CEDA for funding in order to expand their business.

While dealing with milk might be a challenge as it requires top notch cleanliness, the process of making yoghurt is not as complicated as one might think.

The milk is pasteurized then dry ingredients are added. After that, it is boiled up to 85 degrees Celsius and it is rested for about half an hour, then it is cooled to a certain temperature then culture is added for thickening. After that, the mixture is incubated for four and half hours then it is chilled in the cold room after which it is packaged the following day in different Flavours.

Dream Flavours has since increased its product line to include juices, ice pop and sour milk. Ends