Like many, his journey starts in the dusty streets of a township.
He takes the route of accountancy and ends up in one of the big four accounting firms in the world.
Being one of the countable success stories coming out of Alexandra, working for PwC locally and abroad, one would think that his ceiling has been reached.
However, that wasn’t the case for Theo Baloyi whose love for sneakers led him to sneaker-making.
He wanted to open doors for more people from the township.
“Without mentioning any names, there was a man who’d always come into our shop when we were starting out. He helped around the shop and expected no payment. I would always ask how our sales were skyrocketing and I’d be told about this man who I got the pleasure of meeting one day. He is now a Bathu employee, and he plays a pivotal role in ensuring that the whole business runs smoothly,” Theo tells Drum.
Read more | Bathu honours kwaito legend Mandla Spikiri with Ndofaya sneaker range
This is one of the stories that keep him fuelled whilst on the rollercoaster ride of entrepreneurship The 35-year-old has heard The many stories of how his company has changed lives keep him motivated on the challenging days.
Not only has he changed lives through employment with the opening of 12 footwear outlets across the country, but he has now opened doors to a retail group warehouse that he started building 16 months ago.
“It started out as a passion project, and I say this because I’m a product of opportunities. Often times when I came back home, I would see that as much as my life is changing and I’m propelling in my corporate journey, my reality as a young African man is not changing. Driving back into my township, the reality at the time was that my people were unemployed and not by choice but by not being awarded opportunities,” he says as he welcomes his friends and staff at the launch of his over 11 000m2 warehouse in Centurion.
He admits that in 2015 when he resigned and took the leap of faith into sneaker-making, the door was shut in his face at least 12 times. Rejected that many times, he never took it personally. Instead, he regarded it as people’s inability to visualise his daring vision at the time and kept on trying again until the wheels finally started turning.
“We live in a world where there’s so much noise, its easy to be influenced when you don’t tune into yourself and listen to your inner voice. You ought to be emotional about things because you want them so badly. Sometimes people don’t get to achieve their dreams because it was never their dream and what I mean by that is people see something on their phones, they like it and start thinking it’s what they want whereas it was never theirs to start off with.”
Read more | Bathu founder Theo Baloyi blesses new sneaker range with clan name
“Whereas when something is inside of you, you know it, you can feel it and the fire in you will continue fuelling it,” he adds.
In less than 10 years, Bathu shoes have released nine flagship editions with the latest two being under the collection , “it’s who you are”. After Khalanga which launched the series came the Ndofaya sneaker which paid homage to the Meadowlands community and celebrated kwaito star, Mandla Spikiri, the sneaker brand also released 10/43.
“The name 10/43 is the exact location where the first transaction was made and so is the map at the back of the sneaker which is our effort of acknowledging where it all started. Our product development team sat and decoded what this moment meant through the mould and the material used on it. The overall look was modernised to showcase how that moment paved the way for us as a business,” Theo explains.
