Adesina Assets explains how childhood messages about money shape what entrepreneurs dare to charge. He couldn't pronounce a ₦32 million budget in his first pitch. Many founders never price products at ₦1 million because they've never handled that much money, trapped by early lessons about scarcity.
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You would never find me saying I don't have money. You would never say it? I would never say it. And why? I grew up hearing it so much that the first time I had a deal, someone saw me and, you know, I made a proposal and he was like, I like you, come up with a proposal for me on this thing. Wow. And it was like my— it was supposed to be my first breakthrough. Wow. The total budget for the thing was about ₦32 million. I go to the boardroom, I could not pronounce ₦32 million. What? I was saying, this is the budget, ma. She was saying, how much? I was pointing to it. This is the budget, ma. I could not even— I've never heard it before. And apparently what made me write it was because I was using a template. Wow. So ideally, without that template, I would never have curated anything worth that amount. That's why many people will never have any product that can be priced 1 million naira. What? When they— even when they think of 100K, they're like, who will pay for it? Because even them, they can't remember the last time they held 100,000 naira. School, this, they've been taught. You are hearing it every time. In fact, my mom growing up, my mom will call, um, she will say that— how did she put it— that as a man, that's the way God made you, that your private part is death, is basic, that that means that everybody around you, you, you owe them. That's the way, that's the reality. I'm telling you. Declassified Podcast is now streaming on YouTube and Spotify.