Ikenna Okpala: Resilience of a Visually Impaired Lawyer,  Perfumer

Ikenna Okpala might be visually impaired but that has only gone to heighten his third eye and olfactory sense. He turned the loss of sight, which may seem an impediment to others, into lemons- first by acquiring a Law degree and specialising in Corporate and Commercial Law- and secondly, veering into perfumery and cosmetics.

In stimulating his olfactory senses to curate scents and smell for personal use, this blossomed into Alpha Fragrance Limited, an online and offline perfume shop. Call his trajectory one of resilience, will and passion, you wouldn’t be far off from the truth as he didn’t let the fact that he moved from partially to fully visually impaired deter him from living life to the fullest. In this interview with Tosin Clegg, he takes us on a journey of his childhood, path into studying Law, his entrepreneurial spirit and his passion for perfumery which led him to start Alpha Fragrance Limited

Tell us about your family and growing up?

I was born into the family of five and I’m the first child. Growing up was very interesting. I played like every other normal child would play in the streets of lagos and of course, I had a little delay going to school owing to my visual impediment. My parents at some point felt that something could be done medically and so for that reason they tried their very best but like I tell people, their best was their best. Their best was good enough to keep me the way I am today because I mean if you ask me I will tell that my being blind is actually for a very good reason and I just enjoy my life. I had my own fair share of pranks and everything that was. There wasn’t anything specific to me as a blind person growing up in lagos as I just played like every other normal child and every child in my neighborhood accepted me for who they got to realize.

Why the choice of Law?

Growing up as a child, my Dad made it mandatory to listen to NTA news at 9pm. I remember very well I would listen to news but I still had my partial sight as I wasn’t completely blind at that point. I use to listen to FRA Williams who would talk on legal matters, seeing him coming out of court, that was just it for me, you know. Of course as I went into secondary school it was about the time when Mike Ozekhome  will come on television and talk about human right related patterns. I just felt this course looks nice and the prestige that came with the course.

At what point did you decide to further your Law degrees?

Having a little bit of corporate practice, I started liking commercial practice or commercial law-related transactions so I went to the UK to do a Masters in International Commercial Law. I started liking it while I was with the law firm of Kemi Balogun and Co. I just liked the whole board room arrangement. I liked the law input to all that we were doing.

After the degrees what prompted you to do business?

Starting a business has always been something that has always been in me in a way. I must confess that while I was at Law school, I remember missing classes just to go down to Mandilas in Lagos Island to meet one of my cousins. I would go there and buy the suits he imports from Turkey, a few pairs. I would take those suits round to Lagos, to banks and some other places to get them sold. I had always had that passion for entrepreneurial activities and so finding myself in this today didn’t come to me as a surprise because it has always been there.

How did you venture into the perfume business?

While I was in the university, I had one of my close relations who was traveling, always doing trips to France. So he goes to France, comes back with these perfumes and I buy a few off him and I use for myself. I have always been a perfume lover so I continued that until sometime in 2018, we were having a discussion and he said that these perfumes that I buy why can’t I also put it out there to see if other people would buy it and I said okay. I did a little bit of feasibility studies to find out what I will be selling to the last man on the street of Lagos and I found out that it will be worth the struggle so I ventured into it. When I started out the business of perfumes it was strictly perfumes actually but along the way the cosmetics became an addition as we moved on. So as I started then I had a vehicle and I would just put the perfumes in my trunk and my driver will drive me round different offices in Lagos as I had friends there so I just go there and tell them about the perfumes. After the little successes, I decided on reaching out to a wider community and we got good patronage. So I thought it’s good we take this to the next level, at that point I didn’t have a shop, I didn’t even have money to get a shop so I continued and in 2020 we had the whole COVID-19 lockdown and it all worked out. At that point, I now switched to dealing with people online via the social media platforms and we continued from there and then in 2022 I got a shop and reached out to more people.

How are you able to manage being blind and running your business?

With the advent of technology that has been made so much easier. Whenever we get new products, we enter them into the system and we have an inventory software that allows us take in all the items that comes into the shop and we sell only via the inventory software. 

No items leave the shop without being paid for and I can operate the computer as I check through to know what it’s left on the shop floor. I also have someone at the back end, a remote staff who sees exactly what happens in the shop. I would say I’m in total control but I must tell you that I have a team and I believe in teamwork. I have people who bought into my vision and we are trying to see how we can make that vision actually realisable.

What are your plans for possible expansion?

My team and I are looking at more partnership, more investment opportunities and I mean to have come to this point I must admit that it’s not been a walk in a park. Some people have come in to join us in this project and provided some start up capital and to the glory of God I must say I think they’re enjoying the relationship. We’re giving them a good return on investment and we’re looking at expanding. 

Also we are looking at reaching out to more international brands for franchise rights and setting up production outlets in Nigeria so that we can even employ more people and also reduce how much of dependence we have on foreign exchange because the items you see here, they’re all imported. But we have a few of them that are products actually made in Nigeria as well but largely 95 per cent of the items we have here are imported. With a franchise right that will even allow us to begin production of some of these things in Nigeria we would be creating employment and even the government at the end of the day would benefit from that move.

What do you want the world to know from your story? 

I want everyone to know that in every adversity there is this seed of greatness in there. If there’s something that has sustained me so much I must say it’s my believe in God and my positive values as I try to stay positive at all times. I believe that whatever one is experiencing there is a lesson in there and only if one is patient enough, if one put in a whole lot of deep thought to that experience, you would get to realize that there’s something in there that’s going to be more beneficial not just to one alone but to so many other people that will come in contact with that individual.

So for me, that is the thing as I just believe that even if it appears that the future looks bleak in actual fact, it’s the other way round. The future is very bright and I must say that the lost of sight for me has actually strengthened the sight of the mind, the sight of the inner mind that’s the third eye, so things that people don’t get to see I’m seeing it and I can relate with it. 

You must allow your inner eyes to work better than even the physical sight so that’s my take away for people to keep believing in themselves. I tell people something that is very convincing in me is the fact that for God to have made me a Nigerian, for God to have allowed me to be born of Nigerian parents there’s something inherently great about that mission and it’s left for me to discover that inherent greatness. 

Nigeria is a developing economy, an emerging economy whichever adjective one uses to describe the country but it’s a country with very huge potential and only those who allow their inner eyes to function very well will be the one to know at the end of the day what they will benefit from the huge potential Nigeria has in stock.