MoneyStory: How a Mother of 3 Built a ₦900k/Mo Side Business While Working Full-time as a Civil Servant

Age

38

Occupation

Federal civil servant, and lunch delivery business owner

Location

Abeokuta

Housing

₦660k

Monthly Income

Approximately ₦1,015,000 combined (variable)

Current Savings

₦1,400,000

What is your earliest memory of money?

My mother giving me ₦20 for school and saying "manage" on the days she could not. I did not ask what manage meant. I just knew not to ask again that day.

We were six children. My father drove a commercial bus on a route in Abeokuta. My mother sold akara and pap outside our compound every morning from around 5am. Between the two of them they ran a household. I did not think of us as poor. I thought of it as life.

What was life actually like in that house?

Crowded and loud and full of systems. My mother was extremely organized without calling it that. There was always food, always a plan for school fees, always some arrangement being made quietly. You would not know from watching her that anything was difficult. She just handled things.

The moment that opened my eyes was visiting a secondary school friend's house in Abeokuta when I was maybe 14. They had a generator. A private generator that they turned on when NEPA took light, which was their normal. I sat in that living room with the fan running and thought, oh. There is another version of how people live. I went home and looked at my own house differently.

When did you first earn money?

University, 300 level. I was studying Public Administration at a federal university. I started cooking from my room, rice and stew mostly, sometimes jollof. Word got around the hostel. People started coming to my door with plates or sending someone. I was making ₦15,000 to ₦20,000 a month.

I remember doing a rough calculation at the time. If I could cook for 50 people every day, what would that mean financially. I had no equipment, no capital, no proper space. But the thought settled in my mind and stayed there for years.

After university you went into government work?

I graduated in 2010 and spent about a year doing nothing productive, which was the reality for most graduates then. I applied everywhere. Got one offer in 2011, a federal parastatal in administration. ₦45,000 a month. I took it without hesitation.

That was 15 years ago. I have been in the civil service since. I have had promotions, gotten increments at each grade level. I am on GL 12 now. My take-home salary after deductions is about ₦185,000 monthly.

₦185,000 for 15 years of service. What do you think when you say that out loud?

I think it is not enough and I think I already knew that when I was making ₦45,000. The system does not reward years the way you would expect. It rewards patience and knowing the right people and staying visible. I have had colleagues who rose faster because of proximity to certain directors. I have had colleagues who stayed on the same level for eight years because nobody was pushing their files forward.

But I am not leaving. The pension is real, the job is consistent, and I know that salary is coming on the 25th of every month without me having to chase it. When you are managing a family, that kind of certainty has a value that does not show up on a payslip.

Tell me about the food business and how it started.

When my first child was born in 2016, I was on maternity leave and I was going out of my mind with inactivity. Two women in my office had mentioned wanting homecooked lunch. I started making food for them. ₦1,500 per plate, delivered before I got back to work. Then they told other people.

For years it stayed small. Five to ten plates a day, done in the evenings and early mornings, packed and handed off to someone going in that direction. Extra income but not a business. When COVID lockdowns ended and offices reopened in 2021, their canteens were still closed or unreliable or suddenly more expensive. People wanted options. I started a WhatsApp broadcast list, made a price menu, gave people a number to order by 7pm the night before.

Within two months I had 40 regular lunch customers. I hired a part-time person to help with delivery.

How does the actual morning work?

I wake up at 4am every weekday. By 4:30 I am in the kitchen. I am cooking and packing until about 6:15am, sometimes 6:30 if there was something complicated the night before. My husband handles getting the children ready and doing the school run while I finish. By 7am my delivery assistant picks up everything. I get to work by 8am.

In the evenings I prep for the next day. Sometimes that ends at 10pm. Sometimes later if I had deliveries that needed special attention or a client who changed their order late.

My doctor asked me last year why I looked tired. I said stress. He did not accept that answer. He asked me to describe my actual week. When I finished, he was quiet for a moment and then said I needed to sleep more. I told him I was aware.

What did the business grow into?

By 2022 I had 60 to 80 regular customers. I raised prices twice. I brought on a second assistant. By 2023 I was bringing in between ₦700,000 and ₦900,000 monthly from the food business depending on the month. December is always the highest. January and August are always the slowest. In 2024 and into 2025 I stabilized at around ₦850,000 to ₦900,000 in a normal month.

My total income right now is roughly ₦1.05 million combining the salary and the business. Which sounds like a lot until I explain what it is going to.

Please explain what it is going to.

Rent is ₦660,000 a year for a 3 bedroom flat. The landlord increased it at my last renewal in 2024 and also asked for two years upfront. I did not have that. I borrowed ₦400,000 to cover the gap and I am still paying that back at ₦50,000 a month. So that is ₦50,000 a month going to rent and rent debt.

Raw materials and foodstuff for the business cost about ₦300,000 monthly. My two assistants and delivery person cost ₦130,000 combined. School fees for three children average ₦150,000 monthly when spread across the year, though in reality the money leaves in three large amounts per term and the months those fall on are very difficult. Children's general upkeep, feeding, school supplies, transport to school, is ₦135,000. I make sure to keep aside ₦80,000 to my husband every month at least to support him. My own transport to work and around is ₦70,000. Utilities, electricity, water, and family miscellaneous is ₦60,000. What I manage to save is ₦40,000 on a normal month.

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You mentioned your husband is between jobs. Tell me more about that.

He was in construction project management. His company's contracts started drying up in late 2023. His last contract ended in October 2024 and they did not renew. He has been searching since then.

The ₦80,000 I give him every month is not me supporting him in a way that needs explaining between us. It is for his fuel, his phone bills, his ability to move around and pursue opportunities. A man looking for work still needs to be able to go to meetings and look like someone who works. I understand that. But it is still a line item that is coming from somewhere.

He is the one getting the children ready in the mornings now. He is the one at the school gate. He has taken that over fully while I manage the business and the job. It is a trade we have not put into words but we both understand it.

Does he know exactly how you are managing financially?

He knows the general shape of things. He does not sit with the full numbers the way I do. I do not think it would help him to know exactly how many days before month end I am sometimes doing calculations. He is already under pressure from his own situation. Adding a precise picture of our finances would add to that in a way that does not provide any solution.

I carry that part alone. I have been carrying it alone for a while now.

What does a day feel like when the money is stretched?

There is a version of the third week of some months that I do not like. Where I am tracking what is in the account, thinking about what is coming in before month end and what is going out before that. Ordering from my supplier on credit and paying when the salary drops. Telling my assistant to wait a few days for part of their payment.

My children do not see any of this. They go to school, they come home, they eat. That is my job, to make sure they do not see it.

What does your savings situation look like?

I have ₦1.4 million in a cooperative savings through my office and a small amount in a regular account. I was trying to build this up more aggressively but 2024 was difficult and I drew on some of it to cover the rent situation.

I want ₦5 million as a base before I consider anything else. I am not close to that.

What would you do if you could change one thing about how the money works in your life right now?

I would want the school fees to be predictable month by month instead of arriving in large amounts that disrupt everything. That single thing would change my planning completely.

The second thing I would change is my husband's employment. Not just for the money it would add. For the weight it would remove. From him and from me.

What do you think this business can become?

I have thought about a proper kitchen space outside the house. Scaling to corporate catering, not just lunch plates. There are companies that need daily meal provision for their staff. That is a different contract size, a different income tier.

I have not moved on it because moving on it costs money and time that I do not currently have free. But the idea is there. It has been there for two years. I am waiting for a window.

How would you rate your financial happiness?

4 out of 10.

I am feeding my family. My children are in school. I am building something with the food business. I have not collapsed under the pressure. But I am tired in a way that sleep alone does not fix, and the money that comes in does not stay long enough to feel like it belongs to me. It goes immediately. Every month I am starting from the same place.

One good year. If my husband goes back to work, if fees stabilize, if I can raise my prices again and keep my customers, maybe I get to 6 out of 10. Maybe I get to breathe a little. Right now I am just moving forward because stopping is not an option.