Gail Carolus’s journey of empowerment started on the Strengthening Family Project in Scottsville on recommendation from Ward Councillor Hansen’s Office, says Wilmot Arendse, from Social Development. He says that she worked as a cleaner at the District Office : Northern where she found a pamphlet of Fisantekraal Centre for Development courses ( in one of the offices she was tidying). She continued working on the EPWP (extended Public Works Programme) while saving up to enrol in FCD’s Bake for Profit course.
Although she loved baking for her family she never thought of selling what she bakes until she saw the FCD pamphlet. She pushed herself from the first week to achieve her selling target and she realised to be able to pay herself the salary she needed she must increase her sales even more. She kept pushing herself to achieve her sales target and in her last week her income was R1400.
Gail promotes her baking business mainly through word of mouth as she prepares cakes, fancies and tarts on order to friends, family and neighbours. She says that thanks to the Bake for Profit course “My baking skills are better, I know what to sell, when to sell to and to whom to sell my products. The course helped me so much as to run my own business and how to manage my money matters.â€