In a small kitchen in Uganda, Sandra Ejang Elobu, a woman with dreams as bold as the hives she nurtured, stared down at a sink filled with crystallized honey. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. The promise had been simple—set the hives, wait, and harvest the rewards. But after her first beekeeping attempt, Sandra was left with not a drop of sweet success, but a lesson in failure. Her first year had been an epic disaster. The hives were empty, and what should have been golden nectar was only swarming with insects.
“I promise you, we failed,” Sandra recalls. “We put the hives out there, didn’t care for them, and had nothing but insects to show for it.”
At that moment, it would have been easy to give up. Her husband, a natural pessimist, saw it as a lost cause. “We’ve lost the money,” he said. But Sandra was not one to be defeated by a setback. She wasn’t a desk-job kind of woman, never had been. After all, she was an engineer at heart, someone who thrived in the field, where challenges became opportunities.
“Me being the extreme optimist, I thought we had not lost the money, especially if we could put in some extra effort,” she says, her voice tinged with the defiance that would define her journey.
Sandra did what any resourceful entrepreneur would: she sought knowledge. She enrolled in additional beekeeping training, determined to understand where it had all gone wrong. Armed with new skills and a renewed sense of purpose, she dove back into her hives. “And a couple of months down the road, I actually had honey,” she says with a quiet triumph.
From Engineer to Beekeeper
But the road was far from smooth. The first batch of honey she harvested, while a victory in itself, crystallized, leaving her stuck with 100 kilograms of honey in her kitchen sink and no idea how to fix it. “I knew nothing about crystallization,” she admits, laughing at the absurdity of her situation. But Sandra’s resolve was as strong as the honey she was determined to sell, and she wasn’t about to let a little crystallization stand in her way.
“I had to go back to the drawing board,” Sandra reflects. “I started learning more, and that’s when I got into the Mandela Washington Fellowship, which opened doors to more knowledge, more opportunities, and a different perspective on business.”
In the United States, in the heart of farm country in Iowa, Sandra was inspired by what she saw. She learned to properly present a business, but more importantly, she saw how beekeeping could be integrated into a broader agricultural framework. “That’s when I learned how to properly present a business,” she says, a note of conviction in her voice. “Iowa taught me a lot.”
Returning to Uganda, Sandra was full of ideas and ambition, but there was one problem: she still had no money. She decided to organize a honey-testing event to raise her profile and her revenue. “At this point, I was the only beekeeper I had,” she says, smiling at how far she’s come since then.
Lessons Learned the Hard Way
What followed was a journey of growth, both personal and professional. Through sheer grit, Sandra began expanding her capacity. She recruited a handful of local farmers, offering them hives to start their own beekeeping ventures. “I started with one person, then a second, and by the end of the first year, I had five people onboarded,” she explains. The network slowly expanded, and soon, she was working with farmers from five different regions of Uganda. Sandra’s vision had taken flight.
From there, things began to move faster than she ever expected. “I made my first $1,000 and rented a shop to sell honey,” she says. “We started with no plan, but somehow, everything started falling into place as I ran the business.”
Her entrepreneurial spirit was forged in the flames of necessity. Sandra had lost her mother at a young age, and her upbringing under the care of her grandmother instilled in her a deep sense of community and service. “My grandmother was a very people-oriented person,” she recalls fondly. “She was like the Mother Teresa of the area.” Her grandmother’s legacy of giving back to the community during times of crisis, when insurgency displaced many families in northern Uganda, shaped Sandra’s approach to business.
“I realized that without money, there wasn’t much I could do to help rural communities,” Sandra reflects. “So, I started engaging the community, helping them get involved in beekeeping, and providing market access.”
The results were nothing short of transformative. What began with just five farmers quickly grew to over 2,000. “When I hear them talk about their progress, about how their lives have changed, it brings me so much joy,” Sandra says, her pride evident. “Some of them even name their animals after me—‘Sandra the cow,’ ‘Sandra the goat.’ It makes me sleep better at night.”
Empowering Communities and Expanding the Business
Yet, the challenges didn’t stop there. In a competitive landscape, Sandra had to constantly innovate to stay ahead. From offering beekeeping consultancy and microfinance to developing honey-based cosmetics, she learned how to tap into the full value chain of beekeeping. “We now have four brands,” she says, listing them with pride: Asali Wa Moyo, Sweetheart Honey, Aza Naturals (a cosmetics line), and the Nanyuki Beekeeping Initiative.
The expansion was far from easy. “Entrepreneurship is tough,” Sandra admits. “From taxes to staff theft, to finding quality workers, it’s been a constant uphill battle.” Yet, she remains resolute. “It’s been tough, but one thing I’ve learned is that when you start with the right systems, you reduce the risks. And most importantly, you need people. You can’t do it all alone.”
Sandra’s journey is a testament to resilience. From a failed beekeeping venture to a thriving business, her story is a reflection of the power of perseverance and the importance of community. “I used to be called a ‘little girl’ when I went into communities to train people,” she remembers. “They thought they knew more than I did because they’d been doing beekeeping for generations. But I learned from them too. It’s been an exchange of knowledge, and that’s what makes this so fulfilling.”
Today, Sandra’s business is a beacon of hope for many in Uganda. Her farm, a model of sustainability, integrates beekeeping with crop cultivation and animal husbandry, creating a cycle that benefits not just the bees, but the land, the people, and the economy.
Sandra’s advice to budding entrepreneurs is simple: “Put yourself out there. Sometimes, businesses don’t need money, they need skills, networks, and partnerships. And most importantly, don’t be afraid to ask. You never know what opportunities might open up.”
In Sandra’s world, the sweetness of success isn’t just measured by the honey she sells, but by the lives she touches and the legacy she continues to build.
