Hafezz is 31 years old, he came to Ireland 14 years ago and started to work as computer technician in a company in Dublin. After losing his job he decided to run his own business. He was researching what type of business to run and found that an Asian Food Shop could be a rewarding challenge for him. At that time Dublin had become very congested, but Cork was the perfect place to start from 4 years ago. That is how the idea of Aiysha’s Spice House, supplying Halal meat, ethnic vegetables, a wide range of herbal oils, spices and lots more came to life. 

“There were a lot of difficulties”, - he says. “Most difficult was how long it took me to decide how to open the shop. I could open it through an agency, which would be easier for me, but I would not learn everything myself. So, by doing it myself I had to learn all about tax, I did a lot of paperwork, I learned about the legal process in Ireland. And that was very helpful, especially in order to develop my business, I know what to do and how. My customers were my best publicity - they came to the shop and they spread new shopping possibilities about products, services and prices between their friends. And then the people started to come.

Besides the long time that took me to open the shop, I spent more money that I thought I would. You’ll always have unexpected expenses. Probably, the main problem was at the beginning, because we import our products directly from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh it was very difficult to build a reputation. Nobody wants to give credit if they don’t know you. But, after a very hard and good job, delivery has been set up on regularly basis. So now if we don’t have some product at a particular moment, we will have it in one or two weeks time.”

At the moment Hafeez has two Asian food Shops in Cork which are working 7 days a week 10am-8pm and customers of all nationalities including Irish, who come to his store much often then they did 4 years ago when he was just starting. People are now more open to different types of cooking and some of them are glad to find something different.
In fact, there is no Mexican, Spanish, Brazilian, Italian, Japanese or Thai food stores in Cork. So, there could be the chance for someone’s dream of running their own successful business came through.       

Aiysha’s Spice House
32 Shandon Street, Cork, tel: 0214210888
Unit 2, Greenwood Est, Togher, Cork, tel: 0214961888
e-mail: info@ aiysha.ie
www.aiysha.ie