If you are into automobiles, in Kenya then you have heard of him.
If you are not into automobiles then you’ve probably still heard of him.
He graces our social media pages with millions of posts about different automobiles. He graces our pages with the different things that we should know about automobiles.
Sometimes, it makes you want to just close your eyes and buy that car already. However, like every other person, becoming one of the best car dealers in Kenya did not happen overnight.
The journey is as important as the destination.
Maybe by going through his journey, we might get to see how his destination (Kai and Karo) came. Better yet, we might be able to know how true visions are. Just like dreams, visions are valid too.
He started being passionate about automobiles during his high school years. He knew he wanted to own more than one car. He knew he was destined to own a garage full of every type of car he could dream of. He knew he would have a car for every chore – have a car for every event.
His passion was further accelerated when he got to know a neighbor who happened to be a car dealer and would come home in different cars every other time.
He was eighteen, fresh out of high school and was exuberated by the possibility of one day being a car dealer; to have the freedom of being able to actually have his own car choices. Changing cars like how people randomly change clothes. He dreamt big. Dreamt bigger than all eighteen-year-olds of his time, okay not all but most.
Like every dream, you have to actually wake up and actualize it for it to come true. He then asked the neighbor at one point to allow him to just take a pic of one of the cars.
He had just heard about OLX and thought maybe he could use it to sell the car. He didn’t know how it was working but he knew he could use it to sell the car.
The neighbor agreed and he posted his first car (The first of many). The car never got to sell immediately but he saw the potential from how many people engaged about everything they needed to know about the car.
One day he woke up and went to ask for a job at every showroom that he could walk into. He was sure he wanted to do this – sell cars that is. An eighteen year-old boy knocking on car dealerships convincing them that he can sell cars and that they should hire him.
When most eighteen-year-olds were busy on Facebook seeking out dates, he was busy in the same platform trying to sell cars. He had this knowledge that maybe cars might sell here. Why would people spend a lot of time on Facebook, because they are looking for something? Maybe cars are one of the things.
When you are freshly out of high school, with no experience of the real world; confidence is your best experience. He took his confidence to go look for a job in the showrooms. Many bosses rejected him. Many people did not believe that he was being serious about this. After all, what did he know?
Regardless of the doubts people had about him, he knew he was going to sell cars. He knew that the cars were the things that would eventually get him the thrill that he’d been looking for.
Then one day on his quest to go through showrooms, he got a good boss who gave him the chance. Sometimes, all you need is to have someone believe that you can do it. He therefore started selling cars – actually started to beg people to buy the cars.
Convincing people to buy cars is not easy. For one thing, cars are not like onions, unlike onions, they cost a million times more and some. He tried anyway, for the skill, the knowledge, and the insights.
In the first month, he received about $100 retainer from his employer. He wasn’t able to make any sales that month but the retainer was a token of appreciation for the determination and the effort he was putting in.
Unlike many car dealers in Kenya, at that time car dealing was never that online. He decided to post these cars on OLX and on Facebook.
Through these online platforms, he managed to make several sales and by the end of the following month, he went home with $500 in commissions.
When you are eighteen and someone pays you $500, you’d probably would want to buy the world. However, you never buy the world when your visions are still not yet true. Or not anything close to being true.
You work harder for much more money. You persist. You remember how much you want to have the car choices. You remember how much you need to be able to make all these things come true. You continuously post because now you have a platform.
The sales convinced the managers to start embracing the online marketing schemes. They manage to engage people easily, reach out to more people, and convince people to buy cars. When you get into an industry and find people already there, together with your passion you become innovative. You do what these people are not doing.
Like every other business, no matter how many years someone has been in the market then definitely when you get there, to provide a better competition for yourself then become innovative. That way, you find yourself winning over their own market.
His innovative ideas impressed his bosses so much so that they decided to sponsor his college education. The potential they saw in him convinced them that with a little diploma, he could do wonders. He was enrolled for a course in Business Administration.
However, when you get to taste the fruits of being street smart then maybe finding X might not be good for you. So you stop finding X and completely go back to the streets. You realize that maybe this X might be found after the streets have toughened you.
After two years of working with these people, he quit to venture out on his own. When you have too much vision, regardless of the amount you are being paid, you always thirst to be your own boss. He wasn’t left behind too. Kairo needed to be his own boss.
He kept posting cars. Now not only on OLX but also on Facebook, using his own page. He got a market and was able to find a foundation. What is a foundation without a stronger base? What can make the visions more real? Partnership, right?
Imports by Kairo
He got to meet some friends and they went into partnership. “Imports by Kairo” was born. The partnership was good. Being three partners, he was bringing the social media influence, one person was bringing the marketing influence while the other parties were contributing capital. “Imports by Kairo” did so well.
He was getting more followers on social media platforms. Also, the Covid 19 pandemic had just hit so most people spent their lives on their phones. They reached so many people and made so many sales. “Imports by Kairo” made him get his first car.
When money starts coming in plenty, partners not rooted in strong corporate foundations with often find themselves pulling in different directions. This led to differences in opinions, worse, it led to the breakup of “Imports by Kairo”.
On being kicked out of Imports by Kairo, he had this to say;
“I founded Imports by Kairo alone in 2017 as a Facebook page, sold cars with that page for 3 good years alone until early 2020 when I met two of my “friends” and we decided to form a company with equal shareholding.
We also agreed to trade under the “Imports by Kairo (IBK)” since the name was already a reputable brand.
The first year wasn’t easy and one of the directors left.
Everything was okay until more money started flowing in and we secured more investors.
That is when my partner begun to change, taking over more control of the company and frustrating me at every turn.
The situation worsened to the point where he was effectively delaying payments to my suppliers.
I had become a prisoner inside my own company and at the advice of my mother & lawyer, I decided to simply resign and give up whatever I had worked for and start Kai & Karo from scratch.
Bouncing back might often be a challenging thing because of the disorientation that comes with failure. Most people never bounce back.
Most people just call it quits and acknowledge that at least they tried. He wasn’t most people though. He was ready to do this alone and that was what he did. After all, he had created a reliable customer base.
He had become an influencer and people loved his content. This motivated him to continue. This made him put a little effort and steer towards creating a brand for himself and by himself. It wasn’t easy to bounce back but eventually, he picked the rhythm.
Kai and Karo
That’s when “Kai and Karo” came to life. When you hear “Kai and Karo”, you see all those vehicles that have been arranged so well in that showroom.
When he sees “Kai and Karo”, he sees the vision that he was able to create. “Kai and Karo” was born in 2021. He did not know how big he was going to be to the Kenyan industries. He taught himself how to import cars and how the market works.
He has sold more cars than his age at only 27. He has learned that car selling is not through everything else but constant knowledge of understanding the market.
He has learned to be manipulative on the social media platforms. He has learned his ways through social media and he constantly posts on all his pages.
Social media is the new target audience and that’s why he continuously seeks to maintain that audience. With over fifteen posts in a day, how would you miss his page?
With role models like Elon Musk, he is learning that maybe he can come up with a Tesla of his own and give the other companies the competition that they deserve. He has learned the demography of each social media platform and that’s why his business is thriving on the different apps.
He has worked with many first-world countries and even the export sector in Japan is aware that he is the man for the match in the Kenyan used car market. He has traveled the world to check on the markets of the different countries and understands it way better than many of his competitors.
The young boy who used to draw cars in his book is now owning them and walks into different showrooms from different countries. “Kai and Karo” is one of the most known online car dealership platforms in Kenya.
I am not embarrassed to say that I fawned over his ambition. His drive. His passion. His hard work. Maybe when we get to work a little harder on our dreams we can get to see our visions come true. Maybe when we get to build that brand then slowly by slowly, we might build the next business empire.
That’s why the visions do come true.
