Maibujé, the platform for african and engaged fashion

Maibujé, the responsible African fashion platform

Maibujé is a fashion brands e-shop placing african designer creations at the core of its offer with responsible and sustainable approach in order to support local economies. Facing the current sanitary situation, Maibuje produces reusable masks and donates some of the profit made from sales to the french Fondation des Hôpitaux de France.

Discover now the story of Maibujé and meet with Rahila, the founder :

Could you rapidly introduce yourself and how you got there?

Rahila : Maibujé results from an idealistic idea of reshaping the African fashion industry with authenticity creating and online and multi-brand shop. The ambition was to promote a sustainable fashion in favour of local economy and redistribution of wealth.

How did you come up with the idea to create Maibujé?

Rahila : As a consumer, I was myself looking for a place to travel and make impact in Africa, while being physically present in France. The fashion industry represent large enviornmental and social challenges worldwide. Consumers become more and more sensitive about the products they purchase and increasingly ask for transparency. These challenges also represent opportunities in Africa to revitalize the territory and promote a better wealth redistribution.  I ended up understanding that the most important was to place these elements at the center of my engagement and to concentrate on authenticity and the African “Savoir-faire”.

What is the best memory of your entrepreneurial journey?

Rahila : My best memory was only a few months weeks ago, when my former intern sent me an email. She was very happy because she had just been accepted to accomplish an internship at Oxfam, a french confederation of organisation combating inéqualities and injustices due to poverty. Her journey within Maibujé led her to understand her role as a “consum’actor” and her willingness to further engage. And that’s the goal!

What was Maibujé’s biggest success?

Rahila : Building a community of people more and more committed and understanding the “glocality” concept.

…And now, the worst failure?

Rahila : I can easily talk about the mistakes to collaborate with some people, which have become disproportionately large problem because of the current crisis. Collaborating with the wrong people has made us miss out on many opportunities to accelerate and develop the business. Today, we’re still paying for it (even if it’s a very formative failure)!

If you could start from the beginning, what would you do differently?

Rahila : Making sure I collected the major ressources on this niche market before I hit the road.

What advice would you give to someone who wants to embark on an entrepreneurial adventure?

Rahila : Dive in but make sure you adress a need first!

What’s the next step?

Rahila : The next short term goal is to open our own concept store so we can highlight the brands we work with and  show thier products, while sharing the culture and giving people a cool place to spend time.

The next step will then be to travel to Africa to challenge our current sustainable development approach and measure Maibuje’s impact there. This will allow us to identify improvments that have already been made thanks to our engagement and to prioritize further actions to concentrate on. To do so, we need to secure the fundings to go on the field in Africa and to create contents with our partner brands.

We are very ambitious for Africa, especially for the fashion industry and ecology, that we would like to innovate, by developping an African vegan leather that will solve fruits waste problem.

 

Since January 2020, Maibujé is accelerated by Look Forward by Showroomprivé, a one year free accelearion program dedicated to entrepreneurs fron the Fashion, the Retail and the Beauty industries, willing to transform these industries including toward more sustainable practices. 

To know more about Maibujé : https://maibuje.com/

 

Discover Look Forward by Showroomprivé: https://www.lookforwardproject.com

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