I had to confront my limited ideas of myself and what I was capable of. My greatest challenge was believing that I had something to offer that people would want.

Marcia Notshe founded Zoya Naturals in 2015 after realising that she wanted to create hair products for her baby daughter while travelling in South Korea. She was mixing up oils and butters to use on hair, trying to meet a need for products suited to coily, kinky hair textures.

Once she arrived home, friends and family encouraged her to do more with what she’d created, and she resolved to perfect her mixes and create a range of natural hair products that celebrate afro-textured hair. While her vision was clear, the journey to making it a reality didn’t come easily: perhaps surprisingly, given her success, Marcia didn’t grow up dreaming of entrepreneurship, and the transition to starting her own business required something of a mindset shift. “The journey to launching Zoya Naturals was a deeply personal one,” she explains.

Of course, she did. “My proudest career moment, as a result, is undoubtedly the moment I made my first sale. It wasn’t a large sale, but it was a culmination of a lot of hard work both on the business and on myself.” Asked about when it was that she realised that her work held value, she has an answer that might be of use to many wrestling with the question of whether their career is meaningful: “I realised that my work and my purpose are divinely intertwined. Our work is an extension of ourselves and our purpose is hidden in who we are. Thoughtful, purposeful work allows us to discover and walk out our purpose.”

Marcia remains concerned with finding ways to meet her customers’ needs and empower them through her products, and so Zoya Naturals continues to find innovative ways to serve through elevating the African Hair Care Experience. Having enrolled in, and successfully completed, the GIBS Social Entrepreneurship Programme in 2018, she continues to pursue the business goals that enable black women to feel confident and show up in the world just as they are.
— Cayleigh Bright

Instagram: @MarciaNotshe