Founder of Wale Adenuga Production, Mr Wale Adenuga, MFR has revealed how he founded two of the highest selling publications that Nigeria has even seen under his father’s roof although without his knowledge.
Speaking in an interview with eelive.ng, Adenuga who topped the 1974 Business Administration class at the University of Lagos said the seed for the comics, which sold as many as 650, 000 copies per edition was sown when he took to arts during his secondary education and the production of a campus magazine at the university of Lagos.
Adenuga explained: “Right from my secondary school days, I had been a very good artist, and even in the university I exhibited that much by publishing cartoon magazines which sold very well. So, I thought I would succeed outside. I was dreaming of making money. , I was going to make a lot of money. It was a calculated risk. Every business involves a risk, but this was a calculated risk. We had done it on a small scale at the campus, we made money. Then we were selling two to three thousand copies but now I just extended my vision. I thought if I could sell fifty thousand copies I would make money.”
Confident about what he wanted to do, Adenuga said he refused to stay with any of the jobs that they came after university graduates in those days although he had no choice than to work for his father, from under whose roof he eventually started with publications without the old man’s knowledge
According to him: “it was a secret business then. I was working for the old man and the old man did not know I was doing PP (part time business). I hid everything from everybody. When I started selling I didn’t put my name. I was using my nick name Manee Gogogo
Adenuga’ whose latest film, KNOCKOUT topped the box office chat amongst Nigerian made films last week, however explained that his father became very proud when he realised that he was the one behind the highly popular publications.
His words: “ By the end of the first six months, I was selling 50, 000 copies. My father had this insurance company and I told him I wanted to insure about three vehicles, he invited me to ask if I was into some kind of fraud. I explained to him how the magazine was selling, and he told me he has heard about Ikebe Super He was so happy to register the vehicles for me such that he gave me a Volkswagen bus to help with distribution. At that point he started getting proud of me because of the success of the magazine. That was how we produced more 60, 000, 70, 000, 100, 000, 200, 000, 500, 000 monthly. Surprisingly Super Story is the only magazine that beat Ikebe Super but people did not really know this. Super Story came, climbed up the ladder, it sold about 650, 000 copies so the two are the largest ever then. They sold more than Sunday Times at some point.”
He advised business people not to put all throw all their resources into one single business noting that businesses could fail at any time and leave people vulnerable.
Read the full interview HERE
