Toto Ndameshime, a 30-year-old Namibian better known as Chubby, was born and raised in the streets of Wambo Location, Windhoek. He started primary school at Namutoni Primary School and matriculated at Jonker Afrikaner High School in 2009.Chubby is the owner and founder of several business ventures and products like Chubby Water, Chili Chillatoz, Chubby Wear, etc. Some of his products can be found in the local markets of Namibia. “It all started with dancing in primary school with my best friends, which later led to writing songs with my boy band the ‘Magogoz’ back in 2006. It instantly led me to start producing beats, as a musician and gracefully turned into creating a fashionable popular clothing line named Chubby Beats that creates branded T-shirts, caps, hoodies, and car stickers,” he says.Their latest product, a beverage branded ‘DrinkMe’ has 100% concentrated lemon juice. They also recently opened a marketing agency that goes by the name of Chubby Media.When asked about his strongest influences in life, he starts by mentioning his late grandmother, who not only played the role of parenting and nurturing him but was his best friend and biggest inspiration. “She is now an inspiration to my beautiful daughter too,” he proclaimed. When he was a kid, growing up in the dusty streets of Katutura, he has always been ambitious and overflowed with determination. Growing up, Chubby has always admired materialistic things, most of which they could barely afford. However, this did not discourage him, but rather incited his resilience in working towards his dreams. “I promised my grandmother that someday, we would be able to afford the things we struggled to then,” said Chubby, His biggest achievement so far has been his ability to create job opportunities for the people in his community – his people. Another would be having his name brought up alongside some of the huge retailers in the country. In the year 2015, he experienced what he considered one of his life’s biggest downfalls when his grandmother passed on. He spiralled downstream, losing focus on his plans and goals, and resorted to alcohol abuse, and heavy partying which consequently led him to miss out on a lot of great opportunities. Apart from the numerous industries he has already engaged himself in, he firmly sees himself being in the farming space or hospitality industry someday as he has gained a lot of interest in it over the years. However, his next business venture has nothing to do with the latter, he is currently working on a project for the mother of his child and family – a bakery he plans on opening up towards the end of the year. This is one of the things that keep him going and motivate him to get up each morning. “My hustler’s mindset incites my ability to see opportunities, hence my constant flow of ideas and this feeds my ambition to achieve more,” says Chubby. Chubby’s drive and resilience are mainly fed by negative people who discourage him from going after his dreams or openly telling him that they do not believe in his vision or ideas. This fuels his persistent determination and instigates him to prove these people wrong, and with people of his kind, drawing the line barely happens.The capital that funded all his business ventures and projects came from his permanent job and profession of being a fire-rescue officer. He funded himself from one of his business ventures to undertake another project and re-invested the profits in his following project, and before he knew it, he had an independent company. Following his transition from the music industry into an entrepreneur which was out of sheer interest in business, he does not have any regrets of leaving the music industry and believes he has achieved what he wanted to with Magogoz. Chubby believes a business career does not last forever and he wants his legacy to live on and be remembered beyond music. “I started Chubby Food & Beverages in pursuit of a new challenge, and the thrill of entrepreneurship fuels me more as the risks are higher and proportional with the profits,” he concluded.
