“Ya Rabb, please engage me in a trading activity that pleases You.”

I still recall, it was in Rabiul'awal, exactly 2 years ago when 20 bags of our colorful hairband/ serkop arrived my home. I was anxious and excited how to go about selling my favourite hijab discovery to my online sisters. At that time, i had less than 200 friends on my contact list, and I never sold anything online before.
In total there was only 8 colors. I can still clearly remember how i used to place the stocks on a small rack, in a little corner of my room. And we started of by taking photos, modelled in the new arrivals and uploaded the photos. At first there was no response, and then a few hours later, I got back online to realize there were so many Like! and people were commenting on the photos to request for most of d colors we just posted. I was thrilled an excited. Of course, it was my first time. But I did do some reseach on postage cost, if normal mail is safe or should I encourage registered mail and sourced for envelopes to use for sending out the items. And the bigggest blessing, was IB (internet banking).. Honestly, at first, I did not even know how to use it and was rather skeptical about IB. But now it is an element that is so crucial for the sellers' and the shoppers too.
Another thing about getting started, I was so worried if i could sell all the 20 bags of hairbands.. and if there was demand, and IF I really wanted to put time in this, and IF this and that and so many IFs… I still remember, as a motivation factor to pursue the business, I kept reminding myself, "If I do not sell the items, I can always use it for my own coz I needed the hijab wear OR I can always gift it. However one of the biggest IF I had was, If this is what pleases Allah swt.. because I really did not want to embark in something that doesn’t please my Lord…
Then I found a beautiful doa, a prayer that says, “Ya Rabb, please engage me in a trading activity that pleases You.” I did my istikharah for a couple of days.
And since then, things have been falling through so nicely and smoothly. Of course there were headaches along the way, a lot of decision-making to be made and a lot of calculated risk-taking that was made. Every 3 -6 months we had to restock 50-100kg of cargo into Singapore. Lots of work and cleaning up and packaging to be done. But the joy and satisfaction of serving and providing a one stop-hijab destination to the sisters, and brothers alike could simple offset the head and heart and muscle aches encountered.
One of the biggest joys is to coordinate hijab fashion for some of the sisters. They simply had to send us the dress that they were gonna wear, and we will put together the hijab pieces and colors for them. The other big joy is to be counselors-cum-motivators to sisters who have intention to transit to wearing the hijab. And there are many moments where our customers becomes friends and eventually family.
Not forgetting our resellers too. We are glad we became a source of inspiration to many sisters, be it students, working adults and the stay-at-home-mom’s who actually took the first step to come forward to us to enquire about starting up a small-home-based hijab business. You guys eventually became a source of inspiration to us too. ;)
A motivation that has kept us going is a beautiful verse from the Holy Qur'an and I would like to share it with you:
Islam menyukai bidang perniagaan. Ianya adalah sumber keuntungan yang diharuskan oleh syara'. Al-Qur'an sendiri menamakan menuntut atau mencari rezeki dengan jalan perniagaan itu sebagai mencari sebahagian daripada kurnia Allah. Firman Allah:

Tafsirnya: "Mereka mencari sebahagian kurnia Allah."

(Surah al-Muzzammil:20)
If you too are inspired to start up your own home-based business, you can start with a small start-up capital. You never know till you get started. From as low a capital of SGD$299, you can be on your way to building a home-based business. U may start with a few items, and you never know or can imagine what the business will grow into. Like us, we started with 8 hairband/ serkop colors, and today, we have more than 80 colorful hairbands/ serkop, and a full-fledge 'shopping room', that is known as a one-stop hijab destination. Write to us to enquire, or comments are most welcome.
Wassalaam and have a blessed week ahead of you.
With love,
sis zai