Life isn’t easy and there are days we just feel like giving up. Sometimes we just a need an inspirational story to keep us going. There’s a lot of books, movies and TV series out there where the main character achieved their goal in the end.
While fiction can help, maybe all we need is 1 true story about someone who went from rags to riches to really get us motivated. From being rejected from a loan to start his own business to now exceeding RM1 billion in annual sales, here’s the story about the founder of popular burger brand, Ramly Burger.
Ramly Bin Mokni was born in Tanjung Piandang, Perak and raised in Sekinchan with his 16 siblings. Once he was old enough, he moved to Kuala Lumpur to find a job. How did the idea of owning a burger business come about? It was actually when a customer asked him back in 1978.
When Ramly was working in a supermarket, a customer asked him if there were burger patties made by a bumiputera as it wasn’t very popular back in those days, plus people weren’t very sure if the burger meats were halal. That ignited an idea in Ramly.
He then decided to create his own halal burger meat recipe with his wife, Shala Siah Binti Abdul Manap. Ramly went to apply for a RM7,000 loan at MARA (Majlis Amanah Rakyat) to start his business but sadly he was rejected. Instead, he used his own savings of RM2,000.
It wasn’t smooth sailing at the start as people weren’t that interested in burgers during those days. That all changed when he opened a stall in Chow Kit. Ramly’s burger business was becoming more and more popular and by the year1984, he opened his own factory at Bandar Tun Razak, KL.
The successful business owner then opened an even bigger factory in Batu Caves and apart from burger patties, he started producing nuggets, meatballs and sausages. Ramly’s business kept on expanding and his sales revenue hit RM1 billion just before the Covid-19 pandemic.
Where would we be without Ramly Burger? Honestly, it’s hard to imagine a world without it as the brand inspired a lot of food entrepreneurs to start their own business as well. With the Ramly factories, stalls and restaurants opened, hence helping create job opportunities.
Sources: Vulcanpost, TheRakyatPost, IIUM, Mashable, Twitter
