A young entrepreneur is taking the lucrative transport industry by storm through his multi-million rand company Go Go Shuttles.
Kenny Nkuna, 28, from Cork Trust near the Kruger National Park in Mpumalanga, established the company, headquartered in Sunninghill in Johannesburg, in 2016 and serves as its director.
His fleet include three Toyota Quantum minibus taxis, two 22-seater Mercedes Benz Sprinters, a 62-seater bus and a 48-seater bus equipped with an access ramp for wheelchair users. The company, which turned over about R3.5 million in 2017, offers airport shuttle services as well as work, hotel and tours.
Nkuna, who dropped out of the University of Johannesburg (UJ) where he was studying accounting, started the company with savings from his first company A&S Coaches which he started in 2013.
Entrepreneur Kenny Nkuna is founder and director of Go Go shuttles which he established in 2016. Picture: Supplied.He had started the company, in which he worked as a broker, while still in the employ of Sun Malti Trios Coaches where he worked as a manager from 2012 to 2015.
“The initial agreement was that I was employed to grow the company. I ran the whole company. I got them a lot of contracts,” he says.
Nkuna maintains that he built the company from scratch and was the one who hired its first driver. He feels he deserved to be its shareholder. “I resigned after I was refused shareholding,” says Nkuna, who went to Hoërskool Rob Ferreira in White River, Mpumalanga. He says his experience in building Sun Malti Trios Coaches from the ground up gave him all the confidence he needed to branch out on his own.
“I told myself that if I could turn around their company in the manner in which I did, then by all means I could do it on my own.”
He argues that the launch of Go Go Shuttles in 2016 was a progressive step for the transport industry because their company was among the first to come up with a website, with the capabilities of processing bookings online and giving clients quotes on any vehicles immediately.
Nkuna says this concept was warmly received by the public because itsimplified their bookings.
“The company has become a success in Johannesburg … because of affordability and convenience, we are looking at expanding to many more provinces.”
Nkuna says his main clients are prestigious private schools around Johannesburg, which include St John’s College and Crawford College, among others. He also has suppliers in Cape Town and Nelspruit. The young businessman says he dumped his accounting studies at UJ because he lost interest in it. Now, Nkuna is working on an e-hailing taxi service app like after Uber, which he plans to launch in Nelspruit in January 2019.
“People will be able to request a Go Go shuttle using the app. I want to launch it in Nelspruit because people there still use meter taxis, just like a few still do in Johannesburg. I want to introduce something new,” he says, adding that this is part of his growth strategy.
Nkuna explains that the difference between his app and Uber is the fact that he would use his own company vehicles to provide the service. He maintains this would help him keep a tight leash on his company’s reputation. “We will go anywhere for our clients, from urban to rural areas. We pride ourselves in our ability to provide our clients with safe, quality and reliable transportation.”
Nkuna, a goal-driven young entrepreneur, says he wants to be recognised as a premier provider of transportation services in the country in the next coming years.
