Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
Students of the Bahrain Bayan School’s business club aim to make new ‘memories’ as they represent the kingdom in a regional competition in Kuwait this week.
Earlier in May, the team known as Thikrayatna, which means ‘our memories’ in Arabic, competed against 14 other groups in inJAz Bahrain’s ‘Company of the Year’ competition with a range of hand-made souvenir magnets.
Thikrayatna’s vice president of finance, Abdullah Zaini, 17, said: “One thing that we learned which was great was how to work as a team and since many of us want to go into business the whole exercise continues to be beneficial.
“When working on our business plan we showcased how we would expand and market the products and we plan to show that progress along with what we achieved at the regional competition.
“We are introducing different lines of magnets in a variety of sizes and materials. We first started selling in our school and it proved so popular that the plan is to expand outside as well.”
In the local contest they faced seven teams from secondary government schools, three teams from private schools, one centre and one representing the University of Bahrain.
inJAz Bahrain, a non-profit organisation that focuses on youth economic empowerment, stages the annual competition where teams of students aged 17-21 form companies to showcase their entrepreneurial achievements in front of a panel of judges.
The Bayan School students won the 6th ‘Company of the Year’ contest by selling around 300 of their marvellous magnets for BD1 a time. The keepsakes were made in a variety of shapes, such as palm trees, dallahs (Arabic coffee pots), camels and the flag to represent their love for the kingdom.
They even expanded the business into magnet stickers and customisable magnets for those that want to spell out words on their refrigerators.
Abdullah, from Nabih Saleh, added: “Firstly, we are happy to have won the Bahrain competition. We couldn’t believe it when we did. That just means that we have a good solid business.
“We decided to sell magnets because we noticed that some visitors to Bahrain don’t really have anything to take back to their family that is easy to carry. We wanted to make new types of cultural memorabilia. We divided into teams to take over different parts of the project – we had a production team, marketing, management, finance and so on.”
The tenacious teens will be competing against top companies from Oman, Tunis, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Morocco, Egypt and Qatar.
They will present their company’s development in front of a panel of qualified judges that work in the banking and business sector.
For details, visit www.injazalarabyec.org
