Banzifeet

Banzifeet (Pty) Ltd - Meet the women putting their best foot forward

Not all feet are created equal: most notably, the feet of children and adults show remarkable differences in their structure and development. While children’s feet have all the same features as an adult foot, the ongoing development and growth experienced by children means that a child’s foot has significantly different needs compared to their adult counterpart.

As a result, there is a growing sentiment amongst experts that when it comes to children’s footwear, the best shoe may be no shoe at all. In South Africa, children are no stranger to going barefoot – with South African children amongst the estimated 7 million children in Africa who are believed to go to school barefoot each day. While studies have shown the inherent benefit going barefoot holds for developing children, in both rural and urban environments, it is not without its risks – increasing the chance of both injury and infection.

A recent research study at the Movement Laboratory at Stellenbosch University served to highlight the increasing need for creating school shoes that cater to South African children. The study estimated that 98 percent of the shoes worn by participants were ill-fitting. As a result, three female researchers – Prof Ranel Venter, Dr Elbé de Villiers, and Marise Breet – are on a mission to change the way school shoes are made for South African children.

According to Dr Elbé de Villiers, one of the company’s co-founders and directors, the team never believed that their research would lead to a starting a new company. The team had hoped that their research would change the way shoe companies and manufacturers approached making shoes for different market segments, but it wasn’t until they met with the team from Innovus that they understood the full potential of their research. As a result Banzifeet (Pty) Ltd is Innovus’ latest spincubation. While the team is starting their campaign by tackling school shoes, eventually they would love to change the entire shoe market – making shoes in every shape and size to help everyone put their best foot forward.

While it is still early days for Banzifeet (Pty) Ltd, one thing remains clear: a passion for looking after human health is one of the central operational principles of the company.

Prof Ranel Venter

Prof Ranel Venter describes herself as a true “barefoot child”. After having spent her high school years at Paarl Gymnasium, she went on to study Sport Science at Stellenbosch University where she eventually went on to complete her PhD in Sport Science in 2008. Ranel is a full professor at the Department of Sport Science at Stellenbosch University where she specialises in the field of biomechanics. Ranel was the catalyst behind Banzifeet. After initiating the idea and setting the ball rolling, she asked her co-researchers to join her in the project that is currently Innovus’ latest spin-out in incubation.

Ranel believes her entrepreneurial superpower is the fact that she is an innovator, and that she is always full of ideas. Coupled to this, another of her superpowers is her ability to lead, motivate and inspire a team. She also believes that the most important qualities any entrepreneur should have are creativity, innovation, positivity, a willingness to take risks, motivation, and the loving support of family and friends.

When asked about the female role-models that had a profound impact on her, Ranel mentions several female colleagues who she worked alongside when she first started at Stellenbosch University. Among them are Prof Isabelle Nel, Dr Beatrice Wiid, Prof Edith Katzenellenbogen, Dr Hantie du Toit, Dr Margie Lightbody, and Corné Rossouw. In the early days of her career, women faced a considerable amount of discrimination in both a personal and professional capacity, so sharing a similar experience enabled her to form a close bond with the remarkable women around her.

Despite the progress made, Ranel believes some of the greatest barriers to entry facing women entrepreneurs are the social perceptions about women in business, and access to resources and funding. Her advice to her younger self: “be bolder and more confident about your ideas – and don’t be discouraged if people do not share your passion, vision, or ideas."

Dr Elbé de Villiers

Co-founder and director, Dr Elbé de Villiers, said that perhaps the superpower she brings to the team is her dexterity in being able to juggle many things at once. Apart from being a full-time lecturer and having full-time familial obligations, Elbé says she still has to make time to play her part in the development of the company. She credits this superpower to the exemplary role model her mother was, mentioning that in addition to being a fierce fighter for everything that came to her, she managed to balance, and succeed at, everything she did.

Elbé believes the most important qualities in any entrepreneur’s toolkit are perseverance, surrounding yourself with the right team, and having a good support system in the form of family and friends. In the early phases, she also believes that not giving up and being open and flexible to feedback and critique is especially important when you are still trying to ‘figure it out’.

Her advice to her younger self: “grab opportunities as they come along and sometimes it’s okay to take a chance”. She acknowledges that as our roles as women constantly evolve in life, adding ‘entrepreneur’ to the list of roles to fulfil can make life more difficult, but in the same breath her supplementary advice is simple: “sometimes, it is also okay to just be in the moment and to try enjoy something in every day.”