Johannesburg - Sonia Mbele’s grandfather was the first person she learnt to be selfless from.
“My grandfather was the first person to help people get their pension funds and road accident funds back in the 1970’s when people didn’t know where to go,” said Mbele.
The actress and producer’s mother, Zandile, soon got on board with her grandfather and continued to help their Vosloorus community as a leader.
Her grandmother was a matron of the police stations in the community and this meant she made sure prisoners were fed.
“We would wake up at 3am to make sure we cook that porridge and take it to the police stations. The inmates would give us messages to send to their families and if their families didn’t do it for them, we would have to go buy it ourselves and make sure the prisoners had some dignity. I come from a stock of community leaders,” said Mbele at the launch of her exclusive water branding and bottling company Alkamax.
The intimate event was hosted at the Melrose Arch Marriott Hotel in front of celebrity friends and business partners.
Mbele said the vision of the company was to assist in changing the economic situation of South Africa by allowing people to create an extra income.
“This is the business I decided I am going to step into the shoes of community leading, this water is not just water, it is liquid gold. You will not find water in South Africa that has a pH 10+. We are proudly South African. We manufacture the water, people buy from us and resell. We don’t ask for a cent of what you are selling, you sell for yourself.”
Mbele added that introducing alkaline water to people would help them benefit both physically and financially.
Scientists use pH to describe how acidic a substance is on a scale of 0-14. Alkamax produces supercharged alkaline ionised water that is beneficial to the human body and said to help keep the skin, brain and liver healthy and aid with weight loss and digestion among other benefits.
“I initially learnt about alkaline water through a friend who had a sports injury and said alkaline water had changed their lives. After researching, I found there hasn’t been a black company that manufactures the water. I approached network marketers who can make sure products can get to the people. We have been operational now for four months and the response has been so good.”
Mbele said the aim was to grow black business and entrepreneurs to create a lasting economy.