Entrepreneurship in Vietnam

As someone who is working on building a business this year (and having previously had my own consulting company) I realize how hard it can be to create something and then find a demand for it in the market. In Silicon Vally they use phrases like "Product-Market fit" as they plan what type of features for their mobile app will do best amongst their target consumers. When it comes down to it, the best way to sell is to understand your customers problem and solve it for them.

Walking the streets on Hanoi we experienced this head on.

While we were walking, Christie broke her sandal. The heel looked to have cracked horizontally right in the middle of the heel, much like the famous 17th parallel which separated North from South Vietnam during the Vietnam war. She could hardly walk as her heel was folding and she couldn't put much weight on it.

We were walking for about 10 mins desperately looking for a store which sold shoes (sandals). Every second of those 10 minutes was excruciating for both of us. Patience was thin as we couldn't find a place and the heat was scorching. We were both sweating profusely in the swamp like 90 degree with 100% humidity climate.

We thought we'd easily be able to find a shop, as Hanoi, like Bangkok, and other Southeast Asian cities seems to have hundred of tiny shops with entrepreneurial minded small business owners selling anything and everything.

Hanoi seemed to be zoned different, with stores that sold shirts on one block, pants on another, and so on.

We happened to be on the block that only sold pants. There were no shoes in sight, and as the heat and broken sandal continued to weigh on our patience and made us both cranky with each other. Neither of us wanted to wander aimlessly trying to find the street with the sandal shops.

When all of a sudden...

We were approached by a middle aged Vietnamese man appeared pointing to Christie and saying “shoe, broken shoe”

Christie nodded and smiled and said “yes, where can we get fixed?”

He then pointed at his red plastic laundry bag and I said “I fix”

Christie and I looked at each other, "uh, ok".

Christie took off her sandal and he then grabbed what looked like rubber from a motobike tire and placed it under the sandal. Then he superglued it on, and cut around it. Within a few minutes Christie had a new sandal.

The next problem was that one sandal was now higher than the other, due to one now being on top of a few millimeters of motobike tire.

He asked Christie if she’d like her other sandal to match. "Sure" she said. Then we looked at each other again. What price?

He quoted $20 USD, that sounded a bit high, we negotiated down to $15 which he accepted and finished the other shoe. We took a photo to show off the handiwork.

I must say he was an inspiration to me as a small businessman. Find a solution to your customers problems and you’ll always have a business.