Couple becomes tourism moguls

A Bloemfontein couple, Bongi Singongo-Rampai and Nick Nama, have found a big gap in the city’s accommodation sector and have taken up the opportunity to offer first-rate lodging at the cheapest and most reasonable prices to tourists and visitors to the Free State capital.

When the two bubbly lovers visited our offices this week, one could have easily mistaken them for siblings; evidently, working together has made the pair to get along like a house on fire.

The Weekly asked them to shed more light on their project that has been running since the World Cup three years ago.

“We are running a hospitality business. Our services include security, and it has evolved so much that we are considering venturing into student accommodation as we have realised there is a shortage in this regard,” said Nama.

These entrepreneurs are always available to personally take care of their clients.

They can be found in Bloemspruit where they operate from.

“During the World Cup people were urged to lease their houses and we saw a business opportunity and since then we have never looked back,” said Singongo-Rampai.

She said getting the community involved has been nothing but a blessing.

“It’s nice to get the community involved; we look out for houses and flats, and people canrest assured that everything is legit, we have contracts that we sign when we lease an apartment, ”said  Nama.

They have also worked with most of the travelling agencies in Durban and they cannot stop raving about the positive feedback the eThekwini people gave them.

With the annual festival that is starting next week, Nama said the carnival brings a lot of challenges.

“Most people charge sky-rocking fees, which is unfair.How can you charge a person R2 000 per night? People exploit our the market with their exorbitant prices. We take houses all around Bloemfontein; we ask people to send us photos of their houses and we go view the house thereafter we move to the grading system.

“We have VIP clients whom we are hosting and we have been hosting them for some time, among them multimillionaire Patrice Motsepe,”added Singongo-Rampai.

Asked if they also  take houses in the township, Nama said they don’t mind as it depends on the clientele.

“You find that some clients don’t mind staying in the township, but where we can we try to be dynamic.”

He said they have engaged with the premier’s office and the office of the mayor about their concerns in the accommodation business.

“We are not those tenderpreuners who rely on tenders,it’s exciting doing what we love the most as young people. We want to come up with fresh ideas; we don’t want to bribe people in order to get clientele.

“We don’t want these tenders, everyone has tried it and it’s frustrating. We’ve had great response in Willows. Facebook helps us a lot, and we’re also on WhatsApp. People can get us on these numbers 082 594 4570 or 071 531 4839.”