From being Miss South Africa 2020 to becoming the co-founder of the swimwear line Imbe, Shudufhadzo Musida exclusively shares how transitioning to a businesswoman has altered her perception of the world through an entrepreneurial lens.
Shudufhadzo, fondly known as Shudu, co-founded her swimwear brand with her business partners Thithi Nteta and Colleen Murray. “The business was started to directly represent as many women as possible. The idea to start the swimwear line was through conversations we had as women around body positivity and representation, especially in the swimwear space. It is literally a swimwear line started by conversations with women, made for women by women,” she tells BONA.
The team entered into a partnership with Woolworths, where Imbe is distributed for a limited time only. “I worked with them on my first big campaign when I was 19, 22 and I was also one of the faces of W Beauty as Miss South Africa in 2021,” she shares.
Shudu not only partnered with Woolworths because of their previous work relationship but also because she was familiar with their inner workings. When she was 19, Shudu had “very bad body image issues” and felt insecure when she stepped onto the set.
Shudu tells BONA, “I appreciated the culture, and how the Woolworths team was so intentional about making sure everyone was treated with respect and love. That’s something I really loved about the Woolworths brand. I pushed my ideas to my partners and we then started the conversations of the partnership.”
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Sharing her realisations of how becoming a businesswoman changed her perspective of the world, especially as a consumer, Shudu explained, “You realise how much attention to detail one needs to pay when the product is supposed to be palatable for the target market that you have set. Also, it’s the hard work. You have bad days and good days, but ultimately, that attention to detail, making sure that you don’t take any shortcuts, makes the biggest difference in the success of your business.”
She added that being an entrepreneur is also different due to its huge but worthy risk when your “why” is clearly defined.
“From the very beginning, when we started this business, it was knowing why we started it. It wasn’t the easiest thing to define but it was the easiest thing to keep us going. Being and entrepreneur is not easy but it’s a very fulfilling journey. It changes your idea of what agency is in the world because you constantly have to wake up and put in the time and the work but also be patient.”
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