Aaron Tawiah on Building Estaaron Ventures: From Cement Distribution to Real Estate in Ghana

You celebrated 10 years. What have been some of your key milestones and challenges, and how have they shaped the company?

I think Estaaron is a young company, the visioneer is very young, myself. We started somewhere around 2010. I worked in a construction company, Krane Construction Limited; I had been with them for almost half a decade, straight from school. We learned the construction business from scratch, from pushing wheelbarrows even though we had all the certificates. We learnt it practically.

After some years, I had a vision to deal in construction materials. Then around 2010, the vision I had came out and I had a first place with some two containers and a few yards. I opened a shop to operate, so that’s how Estaaron started.
We did it for about three years, and we changed it from Ventures to Estaaron Ventures Limited.

While we were operating from there, we had the opportunity to build our first office and about two, three, four branches that we started with.

From 2013 to when we celebrated a decade of our business, there has been tremendous growth from two or three branches to almost ten branches and as we sit here, we have about 17 branches. It is our desire that by the end of the year, we’ll hit 20 branches across Ghana.

What I felt motivated and helped us is our background as construction people. It has really helped us in nurturing our business, because it will take somebody who really understands construction to let you know what you need, at what time, which cement to buy, what grade it is, what iron rod you need, what thickness you need, and everything. When we went to the outskirts of Accra, we realized the majority of constructions had been carried out by lay masons, possibly with their owners in Europe, they send money, and they are just building. They don’t know the correct size of iron or the correct grade of cement to use. These are what we have blended as young people and it’s really helping our business.

For ten years, it wasn’t easy trying to run and distribute cement across Ghana. Challenges of trucks, managing the human resources, drivers, and all that. But I think we’ve learned on the job. We’ve improved upon our mistakes and now I think that we are at the floating stage of the business, and we are trying to grow along and try to learn from our errors and make it very stable. I think in ten years that is how far we’ve come.

So we celebrate the occasion not just to commemorate the ten years, but also to honor the workers and the distributors who have been with us. When you go on the website, you can see that on that particular day more than 50 sets or more televisions were given. Tablets and phones were given, as well as cash prizes, hampers, and other big gifts were given to most of our distributors who have been our partners now, and overall, crowned our accountant as the new managing director of the company. So I think this is how far we’ve come in a decade.

Can you highlight some key achievements within the ten years?

With the achievements, I think we’ve done a lot. When we started as a company, we had nothing. We were renting cars, but now we have almost 35 to 40 trailers in our name that we are using to do our distribution across the country. We have been able to establish some branches that are not rented depots, but they are branches that we built ourselves.

We’ve also been able to build the capacity of the people we work with. We used to have a minimal number of people, but as we speak, the direct and indirect employment is more than 200 in Estaaron Ventures. Most of our achievements were being able to touch lives.

One of the things we do that we don’t share on social media is that we have about two orphanages under our belt.  From the time they were infants, we’ve been supporting them over the years. And if I talk about my achievement, that is the proudest and the most important one I always enjoy. Anytime I visit the two orphanages once a year to provide them with food, shelter, and other needs, that is when I truly feel that I’ve achieved something. So when we talk about achievement over the decade, taking care of these two orphanages, which I don’t share on social media or even on my website, is the biggest achievement I think I’ve done to change a life and impact life.

Let’s discuss real estate. The Cedi has appreciated; how does that impact your business and you as a business person?

Basically, it creates a lot of panic even for real estate development. And it has also provided a possible advantage to indigenous Ghanaians who want to buy properties. So it is a very dynamic situation because when you begin to develop a property and you are buying things in the market based on the dollar-to-Ghana cedi ratio, and at a point in time, you price your properties in dollars, just knowing very well that it would be the stable way to price it. Then along the line, you see that maybe the cedi has performed very well, which is good as a Ghanaian, our economy and the country. But the thing is, we need to use wisdom in repricing if the dollar is going to be the same. We just need a stable currency. When it’s stable, it’s easy for us to do pricing.

As it stands now, there’s considerable panic. Imagine selling a property around USD220,000.00. That used to be approximately GHS 3.5 million, but now it’s around GHS 2.8 million. The GHS700,000.00-GHS800,000.00 difference represents a significant loss. When it’s stable, it’s a win-win for all of us, but when it continues to fluctuate this way, it becomes a disadvantage to the developer and maybe an advantage, now, to the indigenous Ghanaians who want to buy property.

So, what I will tell Ghanaians, if you want to buy a property, come to Estaaron, our prices haven’t changed, we still charge in dollars. As long as you pay us in dollars, we think it’s a deal.

Let’s look at some of your properties. I know you specialize in townhouses and studio apartments, could you tell us more about those?

So currently we’ve completed the first project. The six townhouses that we have completed has mainly been occupied by Kivo and some expatriate business professionals who are running their own business in Ghana. We’ve given it out to them on a long lease, and now moved to the second phase. We want to develop one project at a time because the way the economy is running, we think it’s not best to open too much outlet of development because in construction, it drinks the money, it sucks the cash. You can only sell after completion.

I always tell people that gone are the days developers will set up the foundation and people begin to pay money upfront. It does not work anywhere in Ghana now. We have to develop, reach a certain threshold of development and even before you can start marketing, because people want to see realities of building than just animations, designs and paying for it.

So we moved to the second phase after completing this, which we’ve done about a year and about three or four months and we are almost 70% completed on the project.

We’ve given ourselves a target to commission it in the first quarter of next year, but internally, we are confident we will complete it before the end of the year. We probably may use the first quarter to try to do a little bit of landscaping. because we want the place to be commissioned looking very green. On our estate, solar is running concurrently with ECG (national grid). As we sit here, the estate we are currently occupying, and having this discussion, is running on both solar and ECG.

So all the light consumable items are on solar, while the high consumables are on ECG. We are promoting green. We use biogas and a biodigester at our waste treatment plant.

So on our estate it is purely green. We are offering customers the opportunity to increase their compulsory five kilowatts (solar power), which comes as a bonus with every property purchase. When you buy our property. This five-kilowatt free solar bonus, valued at about $10,000, is inherited with your property. This is not part of a construction cost. It’s an additional package we are giving to clients. When you buy a property from us, the wiring is already designed for expansion, allowing you to easily upgrade to its full capacity.
We know that currently in Ghana, we have power issues, with frequent downtime. The more people are building, the more we are expanding. If we’re unable to add up to our capacity consumption in terms of ECG, then we have to go solar. That is why we are trying to run concurrently with ECG. In our second phase, we are developing 10 townhouses and 20 studio apartments, which come with a restaurant, a bar, a gym, and a swimming pool for its inhabitants. Currently, we are about 70% complete. We are hoping that by the first quarter of next year. It will be fully commissioned for the inhabitants to move in.

Are you doing something at Spintex as well?

We currently have two plots of land at a very expensive location in Spintex. We are looking at developing very soon. We want to open one project at a time. Once we are done by the end of this year, we are going to move to develop that. We are also partnering with one of our legal firms, when it’s confirmed, we will put all the flyers up there.

We have a very nice location up there in Aburi. When you are there, you can see all the ambience of Accra. We are also planning to develop a very nice and unique townhouse over there for its inhabitants. So it’s also something we are working on.

Currently, we are also exploring the opportunity of developing outside Ghana, which we are currently underway with a discussion. It’s also something we are cooking in the pipeline.

We understand you’re expanding beyond Ghana – where exactly are you looking to establish a presence?

Currently, we are looking at Dubai. We are trying to tap into the townhouse concept design, which is a concept we are currently developing in Ghana. I see this shape of my house as my handwriting. Everywhere I go, I want to maintain it and replicate that kind of concept. When anybody enters our property and looks at the size of the property, the first thing they notice is that ‘oh, it’s small’. The moment we finish visiting all the rooms, then they will tell you ‘it’s very spacious’. So we are designing with space, very critical thinking in our mind. That is why we want to tap into the Dubai market. When we went there, we realized that they are space-conscious. This space-consciousness has really affected their designs, but we want to be space-conscious such that when you enter, you feel the space because buildings are about square meters. So when your square meters are very small, we think it makes living a bit not too flexible. We are concerned about space.

When you look at our property, as I said once again, the ambience you might think it’s small, but when you enter, you feel the spaciousness of the property.

Are you doing any partnerships (in Dubai)?

We are trying to partner with a few investors to be able to do that in Dubai. Damac has two.

We’ve started a conversation in the acquisition of the land with them. We are hoping that we will get it finalized within the course of the year and probably next year we will hit the ground to start the development. So that’s what we are looking at.

What makes you unique, what makes you stand out as a business?

It’s been something I championed myself. I am proud to say it on camera that honesty and transparency is a wealth creation. It is my drive.

In my business, I’m 100% open, 100% transparent, and that is my drive. We come across people, we come across customers. We want to be open.

When I showed these designs of our property to some big companies in Ghana, they told us they want the real pictures and videos, and I told them the videos you are looking at are the rare pictures and videos. So what we put out there, we build the same thing.

We don’t want to share with you a 3D design of our project, and when you come, the contents and things in the property do not match what we’ve already sold to you. So that’s why I say honesty and transparency are key. I always tell people, my tiles and my fittings are from Haiflow.

When I say that, people say, you can’t sell your property. But I tell them that I’m with Haiflow because I want the quality. In Ghana, when you mention that you are buying your things from Haiflow, everybody knows the kind of quality you’ll get from Haiflow.

I’m a cement distributor, the major cement distributor of CIMAF cement in Ghana. So I use only CIMAF in building my project. I buy rods from Fabrimetal and other iron rods companies.

Most of my rods I use are Fabrimetal. So for me, the beginning of my project to the finish, cost is in my mind, but quality is always my mantra. And therefore, in developing in Estaaron, our drive has been honesty and transparency.

So whatever we show you, we build the exact thing. That’s what really keeping as our drive and keeping us going. We really meet a lot of people and sometimes they say, ‘oh, your taste is too high, lower your taste’ and all that stuff, but we want to show the client what we build for. If you approve for me to do a lesser development for you, you have to sign an agreement with me. Because we built the brand Estaaron from distributing of construction material to real estate, we want to make sure we protect the name. The name, we want to protect it, and that is why we are keeping to a certain level of development and a certain level of quality.

Could you give us an overview of the cement business?

The cement business and the iron rods and steel materials were the core business we started way back in 2010. We’ve been doing that over the years. For the real estate, we just started about three, four years ago.

But with the cement business, we are having branches across Ghana, and we have partnerships with most of the distributors across Ghana. So apart from not seeing Estaaron out there, there are a lot of branches around that is Estaron. The meaning is that we have a partnership with people.

We don’t go to maybe, Volta Region and say we want to open a branch. We don’t do that. When we go there, we study the market. When we find one or two good people, who are honest, whose values and ours are the same, we can have a contract and support you with the product you sell, and you pay us. In the other areas where we are not able to find that, we establish our brand over there. So with the cement, it’s our core business. We are expanding. It’s our desire that by the end of the year, we reach 20. When we do a review for 2026, we want to do maybe about 30.

We want to get to a point where we’ll be able to sell our cement that we load from the factory, and also support our distributors who are also buying from us and selling. So basically, this is the cement business. It goes with transport.

That is why we will continue to increase our freight to make sure that we are able to deliver our cement. What really helps our cement business and what really attracts the customers to us is prompt delivery, and honesty comes to play. We will not tell you tomorrow and deliver your cement maybe one week after.

This is one of the key things that brings customers to our doorsteps. I can testify to you that we don’t have a lot of marketers in the cement business, but we have a lot of clients coming to us all the time. Because when you treat one person well, they’ll bring in another person.

Sometime ago, when there were crises with cement in Ghana, we were still serving all our customers. So when you’re meant to have one truck, we’ll explain what is happening in Ghana with the shortage of clinker, we will give you half and give somebody half, we build a relationship with them so that they can grow with us. That is why when we looked at the videos, we were shocked at the number of people that gathered around for the 10th anniversary. We value everybody.

Whether you are the higher bidder or the lower bidder, even during the cement crises, we make sure everybody got something to sell to keep their customers. So with the cement business, me and my team, we are like a family. I also tell people that you can’t take my customer.

Because my customer, when you offer them the same product I sell for a cheaper price, they will call me and tell me that this person came to me. So with our business, our customers are our high asset. We don’t joke with them. We are building a relationship and that is how we want to go about it. Thank you.

What is the five-year strategic vision for Estaaron Ventures?

In the next five years, His Grace abounds and life is being given, we really want to see our estate department become a household name in Ghana. Currently, we are trying to acquire land in locations that are a bit cheaper.

We want to build a community that Ghanaians can easily afford between the range of 100,000.00 to maybe 130,000.00. We are looking at lowering the taste of the finishing, and we are trying to tap into the real estate markets from Republic Bank, Ghana Home Loan to make sure we provide affordable houses. We are looking at not really to make profits from the houses, but we are looking to make profits from the services we provide.

So that is one of the ways in the next five years we want to tap into the real estate market, by reaching a lot of Ghanaians in the lower-upper class to be able to acquire our properties. We are also looking at the next five years when we are going to grow our branch from maybe a sustainable 20 to maybe 50. When I talk about ‘sustainable’, we want to expand according to our reach.

If I open a branch somewhere in Damongo, I cannot go there to do auditing. I have not opened a branch. I have just thrown my money away.

With our development, we are trying to develop and expand according to our reach. Because every businessman, when you have a failed audit system, you have to know that your money will go down the drain. In our side of this business, you know that naturally, Ghanaians, we are brought up in a certain way that we need a bit of auditing, we need somebody is check us to be able to keep us on our toes and deliver on our job.

In the next five years, we want to open as many branches as possible.

We want to make sure Estaaron also grows very well in the real estate even though we started very slowly. We want to build and sell. We don’t want to build for building sake.

It’s business we are doing. So we want to really go at the pace of how the business grows. And also, we have the desire that whatever we are planning to do in Dubai will also be very big in the next five years.

What facilities and amenities are available in your estates?

With the studio apartments, we are doing fully furnished. The reason why we are doing fully furnished is that it’s 28 studios, and at the top normally contains the restaurants, the gym, and the laundry service.

We are doing fully furnished because we don’t want anybody to come with their own furnishing, and changing the concept of the studios. So we want to do it fully furnished so that they will have a repetition of the same amenities in each room. And each room comes with its own kitchen, it comes with its own toilet and bath, you have your open concept hall and bed, and a study table. So it’s a very open concept.

And you are living in a studio apartment, which also combines with the townhouse at the back of it. So it’s like a community that when you’re a single person, you can live in, and if you’re a family, you can also have your three-bedroom apartment to live. So it will be a high-security community because security is very key for me.

We’ll be having the janitorial or cleaning service in all our estates 24/7. For example, where we are now, you can see our greens are green and our areas are tidied up. We don’t leave our estate to the buyers. We manage it ourselves. All estates that we are putting up from phase one to phase two, we are going to continue managing because we want the place to be as clean as possible.

So these are the amenities we have. Even after providing high security, the security door to the house is very secure, very quality. Our tiles, our lighting system to furnishing for cabinets and everything are top notch.

These are essentially the assets we have in our estate that we are using to market ourselves.

This conversation offers rich insight into Ghana’s construction and building materials industry, covering topics such as:

• Cement distribution in Ghana
• Building materials supplier Ghana
• Iron rods Ghana
• Affordable housing Ghana
• Sustainable building materials Ghana
• Real estate companies in Ghana
• Construction materials Ghana
• Building contractors Ghana
• Ready-mix concrete Ghana
• Roofing sheets Ghana
• Plumbing and electrical fittings Ghana
• Urban planning Ghana
• Property management Ghana
• Modern housing Ghana
• Real estate marketing Ghana
• Energy-efficient homes Ghana
• Solar installations Ghana
• Waste management in estates Ghana
• Security systems for estates Ghana
• Landscaping services Ghana
• Housing finance in Ghana

Estaaron Ventures is not only expanding its footprint but also shaping the future of construction supply and real estate development in Ghana with quality, sustainability, and integrity at its core.