Nigerian Online Print Startup, Print Anything helps businesses with top notch print designs and products. The Startup aims to put an end to the disappointments usually associated with poor print jobs and also wants to penetrate other parts of Africa with this mission. Innovation Village recently met with Oluwapelumi Kumuyi, the Brand Manager, who in this interview tells us more about the startup, the challenges and of course some exciting achievements recorded so far.
Can we meet you?
My name is Oluwapelumi Kumuyi, the Brand Manager at Print Anything. I have a B.Sc from Covenant University in Management Info. Systems
What is print anything all about?
Print Anything is a Print Management Company helping businesses succeed with beautiful designs and quality print products. We have an in-house team of experienced graphic designers providing free designs to all our customers amongst other awesome experiences to the satisfaction of our clients.
What led you to start print anything?
Print Anything was born out of research & experience in the print industry carried out by co-founders (Kelvin, Emmanuel & Valentine), The Trio had earlier had a few stints in offline print business and consolidated that with a sample scope of people’s print experiences and most responses were similar, it resonated around “Look at what I ordered, Look at what I got.”
More so, as part of the earlier experience of working with presses and recognizing the millions spent on acquiring printing machines, the owners (printers that have machines) are most times concerned about turning out the numbers and not paying attention to the customer’s satisfaction, quality, detailing & the overall experience.
Printivo is a well known player in this market, what are you doing differently?
Our thriving mission is to power the future of commercial printing in Nigeria, we are focused on creating the technology to power print communities and deliver the best-finished products to customers. We are not in the business of competing but rather cooperating, our offerings, our product bouquet are somewhat different and I believe in this strategy and what we have to offer with the market segmentation. In the end, the customer experience is all we seek to make unforgettable.
What are the challenges you face in the printing business?
The name “print anything” is the first catch, people come on the website asking our sales representatives for the strangest things to print on. Then you have clients and trust issues being an online business.
How challenging was raising funds for your start up?
Funding wasn’t really an issue, the founders had the personal investment and bankable integrity to consolidate on. The Goal was to start organic, growing the business through social capital and expanding the trust window. It was only a matter of time to gain traction and begin the search for investment, grants and business support.
How has the market responded to your service?
As at when we closed shop last year, we had a little over 500 active customers on Print Anything, customers that feature in diverse industries from education to beauty, construction, food etc. We have such a large market focusing on the MSMEs in Nigeria and Africa in the long run.
What are your goals for the next five years?
Our services are currently available to MSMEs across Nigeria, we also occasionally have customers coming into Nigeria (for events) that we provide print & delivery services to. The brand has plans to scale up by providing these services to businesses across Africa.
We plan to localize all our service across all African countries hence the reason we chose the .ng domain. In the future, we would have a printanything.co.za, printanything.gh amongst others.
Words of advice for young and aspiring entrepreneurs who dream of having a
startup like yours
There’s never been a better time to build/create. Provide solutions to someone’s problem and you get value in return, that’s the idea behind any business, build from there.
Finally, what are your thoughts about the startup ecosystems in Nigeria?
It’s quite interesting because we are currently part of the Make IT Africa and there are a lot of founders with interesting ideas, Nigerians are constantly thinking and it’s a great playing ground because of the several opportunities available. Even big businesses are working with startups to develop new products; disruptive ideas have made a level playing field for everyone.
I had read a post recently and one major highlight was “If your business or category has not been disrupted yet, just wait. It will be soon.”
