A Small Loan Leads to Sweet Success in Azerbaijan

Tunzala Misirkhanova bakes sweets in central Azerbaijan. A series of small loans has helped her to expand her business and support her family. Photo: Mercy Corps Azerbaijan

Tunzala Misirkhanova lives with her husband and two sons in Barda, a rural region in central Azerbaijan. Her husband Atalin is jobless so her family depends upon her work to pay for her children's education and to meet its other needs.

Tunzala supports her family by baking and selling a variety of sweets. At first, her business was small and she was hardly able to make a living. Gradually, as the word spread around the region about the great taste and quality of her sweets, she started to attract an increasing number of customers.

Tunzala soon realized that she could improve the business by acquiring additional equipment and raw materials that would enable her to expand her operations. Unfortunately, she did not have enough money to buy these things. So Tunzala started to look for possible ways to get additional support in terms of cash to buy all she needed. She then learned about the USAID funded Mercy Corps/Save the Children's Economic Opportunity program from her neighbors and decided to apply for a loan.

Since she was a hard-working woman with capacity to expand the business, she received an individual loan from the program. Her initial loan was for $600, which she used to buy more raw materials for her products. Her sales immediately increased and this allowed her to repay her loan ahead of time.

Tunzala is now on her third loan cycle. She says that her previous loans helped her to expand her business and she is going to apply for another larger loan. She says, "The reason why I need the larger loan is that I am going to buy a big new oven for professional bakers and increase my business."

Tunzala's sweets are famous in Barda because of their quality and she continues to attract new customers every day. With her new oven, she can now expand her business to meet the huge demand for her treats. The profit made from the expanded business has been used for both investing in her business and for family needs such as her children's education.