After over a decade-long experience in the marketing and banking sector, Ghanaian international Marie-Reine Seshie set out to address the critical challenges faced by wholesalers, retailers, and distributors in the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector with the establishment of Kola Market in 2021.

Born and raised by an entrepreneur, Seshie understood the struggles of small businesses with stocking and financing firsthand. This experience fueled her creation of Kola Market—a B2B e-commerce platform that helps SMEs increase sales, access financing and maximise profit through the sales-as-a-service solution, intelligent inventory management, and tailored financing option.

“Our research showed that most MSMEs struggle with overstocking, which leads to inconsistent sales, hence cash flows, defaults and loss of already slim margins. So our hypothesis is that if we can help these businesses stock right, then the ripple effect will correct the corresponding sales and cash flow issues, and make them investable entities,” Seshie told Disrupt Africa.

“I first thought of management consulting to guide these SMEs, which I did for a period. I learned from that experience that SMEs needed practical hands-on support. I went back to the markets to engage business owners and found that most of these SMEs would rather have consistent sales than take on financing. It was then it clicked for me that the solution I had created in the bank was not a simple financing issue – but the success of it was highly dependent on solving the inventory issue first and then leveraging the power of existing networks.”

Seshie added, “The model we run today identifies the most profitable and fast-selling products and finances those specific products for MSMEs, which is a way to guarantee consistent sales and de-risk SMEs.”

Since its establishment, Kola has assisted more than 500 small businesses in boosting their sales and profits by an average of 25 per cent and has provided over US$5.8 million in GMV for product financing and fast-selling food and livelihood items.

The goal, as revealed by Seshie, is to extend Kola’s services to over 100,000 SMEs in at least three other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa in the next five years. With the recent investment from Madica, the Ghana-based B2B startup is poised to scale operations and achieve its mark.