We chat to woman&home’s April cover star, Connie Ferguson. For the full interview, get your hands on our latest issue – on shelf now!
I often think of the women I admire, like Felicia Mabuza-Suttle and Doreen Morris. They are strong women in an industry that, in their time, was dominated by men. At a stage when there weren’t any prominent female figures in the TV industry, you would see these two women up there doing a great job of things.
Does anyone really imagine themselves as a role model? I don’t think so. I’d like to believe I give my daughters a good sense of what it means to be a strong woman, and I do want to inspire the generation after me positively. That would be a dream.
I’ve always been entrepreneurial and very into cosmetics, but I’m not out on the town with OTT nails and false eyelashes. I’m more about taking care of what matters. When I was in high school, I started a little hair salon at home. You could tell who my clients were because their hair suddenly just grew. Somehow, people believed that I had magic hands. It was all make-shift but it worked.
It’s time South Africans started making more of their own stuff. In the next year, I want to see my range of body moisturisers, Connie Body Care, in every major retailer in SA – and expanding into Africa. It’s time we started making more good, quality products locally, and not taking short-cuts. We think international brands are better than our local versions, but if you look at the small print on the label, local cosmetics tends to contain more natural ingredients.
What do I dream about? The future. We’re still very set in our racial and cultural roots, and while they’re important, they shouldn’t stop us from creating whatever future we choose. We all carve our own paths differently. I’m hopeful that will happen. When it does, it’ll make for really great TV!
