Carol Mandela creates Prindela vibe

Carol Mandela's shop has become a gathering place for customers and a place of community. And as Emancipation Day approaches, the owner of Prindela’s Fashions told WMN the shop is in high gear as people seek to fill their African clothing needs.

Prindela's sells a wide range of authentic African and African-inspired clothing, fashion jewellery and accessories and has been in operation out of Mandela’s home in Dinsley Gardens since 1999. The former BWIA employee said when she opened the store,

“In 2002, I took a VSEP package from BWIA, and I went into it full-time. From 1999 to 2015, I did an open-day every day, and I would have a wide array of items available. We would have entertainment and we would have a fashion show. It grew and grew until it just couldn’t accommodate the amount of people, and so we went onto social media and the rest is history.”

Mandela said when she began, she would do a lot of free fashion shows with non-governmental organisations and churches, so that people would know the store existed.

“It gave me the opportunity to meet more people, and it was a fun thing to do. Another part of our strategy was simply a matter of each one, tell one. When they (customers)came to the store and were leaving, we would say 'next time please bring a family member or a friend,' and then it just evolved.”

She said the store has become a gathering place for the customers who also help out when she’s busy.

“I tell them we have to add to Prindela’s Fashions hangout or retirement centre because a lot of us are now officially retirement age and we still want to look nice, we still want to be out there, so a lot of discussions take place here. On Fridays you pass and see a couple of women liming, exchanging ideas, all within the African fashion and that kind of thing.”

Mandela said her friends who have their own businesses will try to wrap up by midday so they can come and assist her, because they know she’s busy at this time.

“Prindela Fashions is a vibe, it’s not like the ordinary store where you come in, buy something, and you go. I mean you will have people who will be hustling and do that, but, for example, on Wednesday we had a recently retired woman come in who’s been a regular customer and I told her to sit down and relax, and there she was relaxing, and suddenly she was helping customers.

“Then we ask customers when they’re trying on to come out of the dressing room. We have a little runway, we will parade and people will say 'no I prefer this one, I prefer the other one.' It’s a vibe. People like that kind of thing. It’s not the normal stush store, we don’t do that at all, you could touch, you could feel.”

Prindela’s Fashions evolved out of a search by Mandela and her husband Karega Mandela for African clothing in Trinidad.

“There were limited stores that were carrying it here in the 90’s and at the time I was working at BWIA which afforded me the opportunity to travel a lot. So in our travels we went to a lot of trade fairs all over the US and started to source different African traders and vendors. We made connections with some brothers and sisters from the continent, and we started actually with four pieces, and Karega had a booth in the Uprising Culture shop in the People's Mall. He was always into the selling of African items.”

She said they were determined that they should try to get the price point to be closer to the European options available in stores.

“At the time there was a monopoly and the prices were very high, and our mission in trying to sell over the stuff was to make African styles an affordable option, so we wanted the price points to be similar. Of course, we had to do a lot of negotiating with different suppliers to get a good enough price to be able to sell back at competitive prices to the European stuff in the marketplace.”

Mandela said the clothes are mostly sourced from African suppliers.

“One of my main suppliers is Charisma Fashions from Ghana, run by Faustina Kwakye Ansong. She comes to Trinidad for Emancipation and Carnival every year. We made a really good connection and built trust over the years. It’s 23 years I’ve been doing business with her. She was the supplier of my wedding dress when I got married to Karega, and I would send designs to her and she would do them. I used to do custom designs for brides and bridal parties, but that became too burdensome.

She has another US-based supplier out of Benin who sometimes ships straight out of Africa, as well as other suppliers. Mandela said she has tried working with local artisans but has experienced problems.

“It’s either they can’t supply the volume or they don’t understand the concept of wholesale vs retail. They want to sell you at X amount and just put a little markup, and they’re almost selling the same retail price. So it doesn’t work out that way, because if I’m doing wholesale and buying 50, 60, 80, pieces, you can’t give me a little off compared to the person buying one piece.”

Mandela was born in Belmont in 1958, and attended Belmont Methodist Primary and Bishop Anstey High School. She worked in the postal service, the insurance industry, and then BWIA for 22 years.

She said her mother was a seamstress, so she grew up learning about fabrics, style and fashion.

“I should have done that more but I’m very mathematical. Everything for me is analysing and I should have gone into this earlier, but I guess the experience that I got from those other jobs made it easier in this one.”

She said her advice to business people, especially those in fashion, would be to live their businesses.

“I don’t cut off, I work 24/7. If I’m walking on the street, I have on something, somebody could give me a compliment, I would say it’s available at the store. I used to go to Carnival all-inclusive fetes and other events at Carnival just to promote the business...And it’s not that you’re just dressing up, you’re working as well.

“I tell the younger ones you can’t be wearing an Adidas jersey if you have your own line of T-shirts, you have to wear what you sell, and you have to dress the way you want to be addressed... you have to live your business.”

Her latest venture is partnering with local jazz singer Vaughnette Bigford. Bigford’s concert are known for drawing well-dressed people, usually in African wear.

“I knew of Vaughnette from before, but during covid19 when she used to do the Friday night lime, singing for two hours voluntarily, not getting a cent for doing it, just to keep us busy, I said 'wow this lady is full of substance,' and we connected. When she did her show at home when it opened up to where 25 people could have gathered, I went to it and she won over my heart.

“So when she had her Freedom Jazz concert recently, I told her the date isn’t good for me, because July is our high season, but certainly I wanted to support. I came up with the idea to dress the band members and the men, because she had her designers...I thought it would be nice to see the men onstage in their dashikis and so I offered that, and then I gave her other little sponsorships, and that was it, because it’s each one helping one.”

She said Emancipation is the foundation of the store and she tries to help where she can, as there were times when she couldn’t.

But she feels she has an obligation because her customers are the ones who made her.

"Now is my time to help whoever, whenever, I mean it has to be something genuine of course.

“For the Emancipation Day parade, we’ll be having a big truck, and our theme will be give thanks and celebrate. The country is going through a real crisis now, we know that. There’s a lot of negativity, there’s a lot of ill, but there’s always something to give thanks and celebrate for.”

She said Prindela’s won’t be at the Emancipation Village in the Queen’s Park Savannah, as the shop has its own village.

"Basically, the store is a safe place, a therapeutic setting for some people. They sit down, they watch the colours, it’s a nice, positive, pleasant place to be, and I am glad I am able to do that. I’m glad we’ve been able to grow, we have a lot of support, we have a community around us of loyal customers.”