Benjah Box: my entrepreneurial dream
written by Saber Benjah, BSc in Business Administration student
June 22 2017
Saber Benjah, current student of BSc in Business Administration, describes his entrepreneurial journey to develop the first online mint tea delivery service.
''As a young boy I would always help my father with his fresh herbs business. He sold them from a small van to different businesses - from butchers to local stores - in Utrecht.
A few years ago I noticed that many people drink coffee or mint tea in cafés in the Netherlands. In relation to that, I always had a dream of bringing people together with a world-known mint tea brand. The first time I pitched this dream was during a challenge at Nyenrode. As a winner of this challenge I received a scholarship which gave me the opportunity to follow the Bachelor of Science in Business Administration program.
In order to make my dream become a reality I went to restaurants and cafes trying to sell my mint. I was declined. I went to Catering Companies. I was declined. Eventually I wrote an email to Ahold. They believed in it, but they also gave me no for an answer. So eventually I got frustrated... I asked myself all the time: there should be a way to sell mint tea online.
One day, my roommate entered the room with a small box and an idea struck me. I immediately went home and grabbed some fresh mint, put it in an enveloppe and showed it to my father. Look! Fresh mint, online delivered! His response was: genius! From that moment on, I started to work on a prototype. During that phase I got a lot of feedback from many people all over the Netherlands. Also a lot of students and teachers gave me strong feedback. I even managed to get a small storage space on campus.
Two months ago I launched my startup online: the first online mint tea delivery service. Each Benjah Box contains fresh Moroccan mint tea, green tea and cookies. We donate 10% of the revenue to charity. The launch went viral on social media, I was on tv and we got nominated for a business award.
Three weeks ago from the 100 startups, we had to pitch in the finals of the Funx Media Business Award and we won an advertising campaign worth €10.000.
Even though we are a small startup, the future looks bright! Business is going well and I believe that we have a great potential. We need to focus on growing and joining more pitch competitions. We want to become a big Dutch company that will do awesome things worldwide.''
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