To build a retail brand in South Africa, start small and grow organically, sell products with a real story instead of competing on price, and learn your margins cold before you scale. De Afrikander Handelshuis did exactly that. It started as a festival T-shirt stall in 2013 and grew into a household name now stocked in 175+ shops, all without outside funding. The lessons are simple but hard: commit fully, build a unique offer people remember, protect a wholesale margin of at least 30%, scale through partners you can rely on, and lead trends instead of chasing fads. This is the V8 Media episode with founder Charl Oberholzer, written out with the real numbers, from the team behind R2+ billion in client sales.
Everyone wants to build a brand. Almost nobody wants to do the boring part first.
Charl Oberholzer did the boring part. For years.
He went from selling T-shirts at weekend festivals to running De Afrikander Handelshuis, a proudly South African retail brand now in more than 175 stores. No investors. No shortcut.
We pulled the whole story apart on the podcast. Watch the full chat below.
This is the written version, with the real margins, the mistakes, and the playbook you can copy, so you can build a retail brand that lasts in South Africa.
How did De Afrikander Handelshuis become a household name?
It started the way most things start. Small and a bit naive.
"Like every young guy, we thought, let's start a T-shirt company. It's cool," Charl said.
So in 2013, he and his wife Liza-Mari began selling South African T-shirts at festivals over weekends, according to the brand's own history. Other ideas came and went. The T-shirts kept growing.
The name itself carries a story. It is pulled from the words of Hendrik Biebouw, who in 1707 declared "Ik ben een Afrikander". The whole brand is built on proudly South African heritage, not just a logo on a tee.
Then they took the leap. Both quit their jobs. They put their last savings into a shop at a tourism spot.
"We had to burn the ships and give everything," Charl said.
That shop changed everything. It forced them to stop being a T-shirt stall and start being a real retail brand. Today the Republk range they launched in 2018 sits in 175+ shops, with a goal of 250.
Here is the journey in plain terms.
| Stage | What they did | The lesson |
|---|---|---|
| 2013, side hustle | Sold SA T-shirts at festivals on weekends | Start small, test demand cheaply |
| The leap | Quit jobs, used last savings on a shop | Commit fully or stay a hobby |
| The pivot | Expanded from tees into storytelling gifts | Adapt the offer to the market |
| The brand | Launched Republk, made "local" cool again | Sell meaning, not just product |
| Scale | Grew to 175+ shops, bootstrapped | Grow on your own terms, keep control |
None of this was luck. It was a sequence. Let's break down the parts you can actually steal.
What does it really mean to "burn the ships"?
This is where most people get stuck. They keep one foot in the safe job.
You cannot half-build a brand. A side project gets side-project effort, and side-project effort gets side-project results.
Charl and Liza-Mari left their jobs and leaned on their last savings. Scary? Of course. But it removed the escape hatch.
When there is no plan B, plan A gets all of you. That pressure is what turned a weekend hobby into a real business.
Now, do not be reckless. Burning the ships does not mean betting money you cannot afford to lose with no idea if anyone wants your product.
They had already sold T-shirts for three years before they jumped. They had proof people wanted it. The leap came after the test, not before.
That is the order. Test cheaply on weekends. See real demand. Then go all in. Most people do it backwards, quit first and figure out demand later, and run out of cash before they learn anything.
Why does storytelling beat discounting in retail?
Here is the part that built the brand. They stopped selling products and started selling stories.
When they opened that tourism shop, T-shirts alone would not cut it. So they learned product development fast and moved into gifting.
"We knew we couldn't just sell T-shirts, so we quickly had to learn how to do product development," Charl said.
But the twist was the story. Every product came with a meaning, a piece of South African history, a reason it existed.
A mug is a mug. A mug with a proudly South African story is a gift someone takes home from holiday and remembers. Same cost. Very different value.
That gap between cost and what people will happily pay is the whole game in retail. Charl called it creating "a final product that has a high perceived value".
Think about it in Rand. A plain item might cost you R40 to make and sell for R80. Wrap it in a story people connect with and the exact same item sells for R180, and they feel good paying it.
You did not change the cost. You changed the meaning. That is branding, and it is the cheapest margin you will ever add.
And in South Africa, local sells. 55% of South African consumers prefer to buy locally made products from small businesses in their area, according to NielsenIQ research (2022). A proudly South African story is not a nice-to-have. It is what people are already looking for.
This is the same lesson we unpack in branding vs sales campaigns when starting a new business. A brand people trust does not have to win on price.
What margins do you actually need in retail?
This is where dreams meet maths. And most new brands get the maths wrong.
Clothing and gifting are brutal. Charl said it straight: "Clothing can be a nightmare. It's capital intensive, and cash flow is king."
You are buying stock months ahead. You are guessing sizes, colours and seasons. Your money is sitting on shelves, not in the bank.
So the margin has to be big enough to survive the mistakes. Here is the rule Charl shared from years of doing it.
| If you are the... | Margin you need | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Wholesaler | At least 30%, aim for a 100% markup | You carry stock and risk, and the retailer still needs room |
| Retailer | Roughly double what you paid | Rent, staff, marketing and shrinkage all come out of that gap |
Read that again. The retailer sells at double the cost price just to cover the basics and make a little profit.
So if you want to sell wholesale into shops, your price to them has to leave them that room. Price it too high and no shop will stock you. Price it too low and you go broke filling orders.
New owners almost always underestimate the costs. Marketing, packaging, couriers, payment fees, returns. It all eats the margin you thought you had.
If you sell products online, this is exactly the trap we break down in how much profit the average ecommerce store makes. Know your true margin before you scale anything.
Charl's fix was to vertically integrate, which just means controlling more of his own supply chain. Make more of it yourself, control quality, and stop handing your margin to middlemen.
Should you scale through your own stores or through wholesale?
Once a brand works, the question becomes: how do you get bigger, fast?
Handelshuis is doing both. Their own retail stores, and wholesale through the Republk brand into other people's shops.
The plan is bold. Open 13 of their own shops in the Pretoria area over three years, and push the wholesale range from 175 shops to 250.
But Charl learned one hard lesson about where you put your stores. Avoid being trapped by slow partners.
"If you want to scale quickly, don't work with state entities," he said.
Opening in state-owned locations meant tender processes, unpredictable leases, and growth that crawled. Great for stability, terrible for speed.
Wholesale is speed. Your own stores are control. You do not own the customer when someone else runs the shop they bought from. Your own stores are slower to open, but you keep the brand, the experience and the data.
Most strong SA brands run both, like the local heroes we covered in Tshepo Jeans and how SakSak became SA's hottest bag brand. Wide reach through wholesale, deep control through their own channels.
One more thing Charl flagged: technology. Proper stock systems are not optional once you grow. Without them you are flying blind across dozens of shops.
How do you lead trends instead of chasing fads?
This is the difference between a brand that lasts and one that disappears.
Charl is blunt about it. "Be careful of creating something that you don't agree with. That's why I'm really scared of fads."
A fad is hot for a season then dead. You chase it, order stock, and by the time it lands the trend is gone. Now you are sitting on dead inventory.
A trend you lead is different. You decide what your brand stands for and you pull the market towards it.
"If you want to be a market leader, you have to dictate what is cool right now," Charl said.
His sharpest line was this one: "We shouldn't adapt to our target market; they should adapt to us because we have to dictate what's necessary in the market."
That sounds arrogant until you see it work. Strong brands do not follow. They set the tone and the right customers follow them.
The trick is authenticity. Build products that are a real extension of your brand and values. Those last. Chase whatever is trending on TikTok this week and you build nothing.
Want to reach the right people without burning cash? Our guide on how to use Instagram and TikTok to generate sales for free shows how to use content to lead, not chase.
Can you really build a retail brand without investors?
Short answer: yes. Handelshuis did.
They grew the whole thing without external funding. That is rare, and it is on purpose.
Bootstrapping, which means funding growth from your own sales instead of investor money, is slower. But it keeps you in control and forces discipline.
When every Rand of growth comes from profit, you cannot waste it. You learn margins, cash flow and pricing the hard way, because you have no safety net.
The upside is huge. No investor telling you to chase the wrong fad. No pressure to grow faster than the business can handle. You own all of it.
The discipline this builds is the same one we see in every brand that survives a tough SA economy. It is the opposite of burning a big round on a logo, a nice office, and zero traction.
"Grow organically and learn the market. Know where you have influence and where you don't," Charl advised.
That is the bootstrapper's edge. No fat. No waste. You see the cash flow gap before it becomes a crisis, because every Rand came from something you worked for.
How do you take a physical retail brand online?
Here is the wall almost every SA retail brand hits. Online.
Charl admitted it plainly: "We have a lot of things to fix and build online. That's a significant focus area."
That honesty is common. Brilliant in-store, behind online. Most physical retailers in South Africa are exactly here.
And the runway is huge. Online still makes up only about 8% of all retail in South Africa, according to World Wide Worx's 2025 Online Retail in South Africa report. Most of the spending is still out there to win.
Your brand is the hard part. You already built it. Now online is just a new shelf.
But most physical retailers get this wrong. They build a digital brochure. Pretty. Useless. Your site must sell. Clear product stories, fast checkout, mobile first.
Then you drive traffic to it. This is where paid ads pull their weight. A brand with a real story and proven products is exactly what performs on Meta Ads and Google Ads, because you are not relying on a discount to get the click.
Get the online engine right and you are no longer limited to people who walk past your shop. You can sell that proudly South African story to the whole country, and to South Africans living abroad who miss home.
That is how a regional retail brand becomes a national one. The shop builds the brand. The internet just puts it in front of people who can't walk past.
What is the best advice for a new retail founder?
Charl's closing advice was simple and a little brutal. Worth pinning above your desk.
- Invest in yourself. "Read as many books as you can. Invest in your knowledge and skills."
- Make mistakes early. "The earlier you make mistakes, the less costly they are." A pricing mistake at one shop is cheap. The same mistake across 50 shops is not.
- Be true to yourself. "If you're not someone who buys fancy brands, don't start a fancy brand." Build something you actually believe in.
- Set the sail early. "Decide where you want to end up, and it will influence your decisions along the way." Your end goal shapes your software, location and pricing today.
And the line that sums up the whole episode: "Don't wish things were easier; wish you were better."
That is the founder's mindset. The market is hard. The SA economy is rough. You do not get to fix that. You just get to stop being soft about it.
Frequently asked questions
How do you build a retail brand in South Africa from scratch?
Start small and prove demand cheaply, the way De Afrikander Handelshuis did by selling T-shirts at festivals for three years before committing full time. Once you have proof people want it, go all in. Build products with a real story so you compete on meaning, not price. Learn your margins cold before you scale: aim for at least a 30% wholesale margin, ideally a 100% markup. Then grow through a mix of your own stores and wholesale partners, and fund it from profit if you can to keep control.
What margin do you need to sell wholesale to retailers?
As a wholesaler you need a minimum of around 30%, but you should aim for a 100% markup, according to Handelshuis founder Charl Oberholzer. The reason is that the retailer who buys from you typically needs to sell at roughly double the price they paid, to cover rent, staff, marketing and shrinkage and still make a profit. So your wholesale price must leave the retailer that room. Price too high and no shop stocks you. Price too low and you cannot afford to fill the orders.
Is it better to scale through your own shops or through wholesale?
Most strong brands do both. Wholesale gets your product into many shops quickly, but you do not own the customer relationship. Your own stores are slower and more expensive to open, but you control the brand, the experience and the customer data. Handelshuis is doing both: opening 13 of its own shops in the Pretoria area over three years while growing its wholesale Republk range from 175 shops towards 250. Charl's one warning was to avoid slow partners like state entities if you want to scale fast.
Can you build a retail brand without investors?
Yes. De Afrikander Handelshuis grew to 175+ shops without any external funding. This is called bootstrapping, funding growth from your own sales rather than investor money. It is slower, but it keeps you in full control and forces real discipline because every Rand of growth has to come from profit. The trade-off is patience for ownership. You avoid investors pushing you to grow faster than the business can handle or chase trends you do not believe in.
Why does storytelling work so well for retail products?
Because it lifts perceived value without lifting your costs. A plain product competes on price, which is a race to the bottom. The same product wrapped in a real story, like the South African heritage behind every Handelshuis design, becomes something people are happy to pay more for and remember. Charl built the brand on creating products with a high perceived value at a low cost. That gap between what it costs you and what people happily pay is where retail profit lives, and a story is the cheapest way to widen it.
How do you move a physical retail brand online in South Africa?
Treat your website as a shop that sells, not a brochure. You need clear product stories, a fast mobile-first checkout, and trusted payment options. Then drive traffic with paid ads on Meta and Google, which work well for a brand that already has a story and proven products, because you are not relying on discounts to earn the click. Done right, online lifts you from selling only to people who walk past your shop to selling your brand across the country, and to South Africans abroad.
Key takeaways
- Start small and prove demand before you commit. Handelshuis sold T-shirts at festivals from 2013 before going all in, then grew to 175+ shops with no outside funding.
- Sell stories, not products. Wrapping a product in real South African meaning lifts perceived value without lifting cost. That gap is your profit.
- Know your margins cold. Aim for at least 30% wholesale, ideally a 100% markup, because the retailer still needs to sell at roughly double cost.
- Scale with both your own stores and wholesale, and avoid slow partners. Charl's rule: "If you want to scale quickly, don't work with state entities."
- Lead trends, don't chase fads. Build products true to your brand, take it online to scale nationally, and fund growth from profit to keep control.
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