In 2017, Meryem Chin saw a gap in the Muslim market and sought the opportunity to fill it through the establishment of Takva, an innovation-centric Muslim lifestyle brand an innovation-centric Muslim lifestyle brand focusing on products catered to young Muslims around the world.
Meryem grew her brand by innovating on everyday lifestyle essentials such as foldable prayer mats and water-resistant prayer parkas for frequent travellers. Takva’s product offerings were unique and niche to a specific target audience, hence Meryem strove to build brand awareness on a global level as Singapore only had a small domestic market.
Meryem had heard that there are available grants SMEs could tap on, prompting her to reach out to Dale Aroozoo, one of our Business Advisors for advice.
Setting goals for scalability
As a start, Dale guided Meryem to create a business plan – a critical component in charting the business’s plans for expansion and stability.
“I sat down with Meryem and her husband to identify the company’s goals and strategies they can adopt to achieve them. We also developed a 3-year financial projection to guide them in measuring their progress,” highlighted Dale.
Their aspirations to penetrate foreign markets turned into an opportunity when Meryem came across the Muslim Lifestyle Expo, a two-day Muslim lifestyle event that would take place in Manchester, UK. Since the exhibition was taking place overseas, Dale encouraged her to apply for the Market Readiness Assistance (MRA), a grant that supports SMEs in their international activities.
In December 2019, Takva was awarded the MRA grant, providing significant financial relief for their first participation in an exhibition overseas.
“This opportunity has provided us a platform to network with other global brands and expose ourselves to the Muslim consumer market. We’re looking forward to participating in similar platforms in the future,” shared Meryem.