Step-Change: Micro-Entrepreneurs’ Entry into the Middle-Class Market

Abstract

With upcoming middle classes in Africa, micro-entrepreneurs witness new opportunities that can potentially lift them out of poverty. Exploiting these opportunities requires entrepreneurs to make a 'step-change' away from the bottom of the pyramid to middle-class markets. This process hosts potential conflicts between informal-sector and formal-sector stakeholders as it requires both new resources and continued access to existing resources. By taking a strategic marketing perspective, this study labels and defines the phenomenon of step-change and offers an explanatory conceptual framework for it. The article draws implications for business development, the gender debate, as well as academic research.

Young Entrepreneurs in the Mobile Telephony Sector in Ghana: From Necessities to Aspirations

“…A basic assumption is that most entrepreneurs in Africa start their businesses on their own because they cannot find jobs elsewhere and, therefore, develop businesses that tend to be survivalist in orientation (Frese & de Kruif, 2000). Furthermore, there is a gendered dimension to the entrepreneurship motivation discourse where women are observed to dominate in the informal or survivalist sector with limited growth prospects (Babah Daouda et al, 2016).…”

Understanding entrepreneurship at the base of the pyramid in developing countries : insights from small-scale vegetable farmers in Benin

“…Economic entities such as small enterprises embedded in the local communities rely to a greater extent on informal institutions for providing complementary, substitute mechanisms for their activities (Webb et al, 2014). These informal institutions consist of family ties for operational support regarding labour, financial resources (Webb et al, 2015), social capital (Babah Daouda et al, 2016;Ingenbleek, 2014), business networks (Boso et al, 2013a;Boso et al, 2013b), and informal savings schemes (Dia, 1996), or traditional credit or trust systems.…”

Engaging Stakeholders Through Corporate Political Activity: Insights From MNE Nonmarket Strategy in an Emerging African Market

“…A key element in this model was the co-existence of both formal and informal institutions in a way that related with highly informal cultures (Williams et al, 2017). Another element was the ever stronger realization that the future of Africa lay in opening up possibilities for the millions at the grassroots and enabling ever more of them to progress to the middle class (Babah Daouda et al, 2016). MNEs collectively had an opportunity to support this process by designing their projects to contribute to basic skills development at the grassroots, for example enhanced entrepreneurship and local institutional development skills, as well as the creation of cohesive markets across borders.…”