Even as a little girl, Durotoye would teach English and math to the kids she met when she went to visit her grandmother in a small village. Today Dorotoye runs 14 beauty schools teaching a variety of skills including personal and professional makeup, and the business side of beauty. Dorotoye guestimates that 80 percent of Nigeria’s makeup artists went to one of her schools.
Source: Cnn.com
When Durotoye was 23 she began doing makeup for her friends at university. As Nigeria’s economy improved and people had money for more luxuries, she began doing makeup for weddings and film sets.
Source: Cnn.com , Pridemagazineng.com
In 1998 Durotoye began a startup bridal makeup company and by 2000 she had begun offering the very first bridal seminars in Nigeria. Durotoye found brides-to-be in the Nigerian professional world and invited them to hear her tips.
Source: Pridemagazineng.com
L’Oreal approached House of Tara about being a partner in Nigeria, helping to distribute and market L’Oreal’s line around the country. House of Tara accepted, and it was this move that caught the attention of Forbes.
Source: CNN.com
Durotoye works as a motivational speaker. The beauty mogul gave a talk, “Wealth from Nothing” in which she said wealth, for her, comes from the inside — not what’s in the bank but what’s in the mind.
Source: Cnn.com
Durotoye began her business with just 15,000 naira — that’s around $75. Today she pays more than 100 employee salaries every month. In 2011 she saw net sales of $7 million.
Source: Cnn.com, Smartmoneywitharese.com
In a CNN interview Durotoye said she feels certain about where she is headed and that she will get there, but that she worries she will forget to enjoy the journey. She said she tries every day to “…smell the rain, touch the flowers, be aware of the people around me who are contributing and helping to make my dreams come true…recognize their faces remember their voice.”
Source: Cnn.com
Durotoye is married with three sons. When asked how she keeps balance in her life, she said, “I don’t think you can ever really have balance. Balance is seasonal…But sometimes one area of your life might require more attention than others…Generally one aspect of your life suffers, depending on the season…I think balance is really about being conscious of the seasons…”
Source: Smartmoneywitharese.com
To make time to herself, Durotoye wakes up at 4 a.m. every morning before her sons get up. She prays, meditates and puts her goals in perspective. From then until around 9 a.m., she is with her children, taking them to school, and then finally joining her staff for another prayer session with them. At 9:15 a.m. she has an executive meeting with department heads.
Source: Smartmoneywitharese.com
Take a finance course for non-finance managers and read several books on the subject — that’s Durotoye’s advice for entrepreneurs. “You can only truly understand your business when you have a firm grasp of the numbers,” she said. “When you keep proper records and go over them regularly, you start to see areas where the business can grow.”
Source: Smartmoneywitharese.com
Durotoye said self-development and training her staff are some of her most important investments. She attended the Lagos Business School Owner Manager Program, the Blue Ocean Strategy course at INSEAD, a graduate business school with campuses all over the world, Africa’s Business Leadership program and the Stanford SEED program.
Source: Smartmoneywitharese.com
Durotoye took in her first student at House of Tara for free. Because she didn’t yet know what her structure or curriculum would be, Durotoye used the first student as a guinea pig. She’s always been an advocate for independent women, and through her program for beauty representatives, helped more than 800 women become successful.
Source: Pridemagazineng.com
