The Company

Last year Amazon.com did $10 billion in turnover. That’s about what Pick ‘n Pay and Shoprite did combined. Internationally e-commerce is huge. In South Africa we’ve barely left the starting blocks.

Are you interested in joining a small, dynamic team of pioneers in Cape Town who are at the forefront of the struggle to make e-commerce work in South Africa? We are on a journey to overcome the obstacles of fraud, logistics delays, packaging shortages and poor customer service. We are working on our own e-commerce sites (Yuppiechef.co.za, FlagKit.co.za, Bugzapper.co.za), consulting with other companies, publishing a book and making a movie. You will be exposed to it all, but will require specific skills in customer service.

[Update: This position was recently filled. We will publish new positions as they come available.]

Thank you everyone for your loving support, we really do appreciate it. Three cheers all round!

(Picture of Andrew on his second birthday, just after he received a gift he didn't really want!) 

The Live Alchemy partners dream about having a bright-spark to help them with the daily runnings of the company. We decided to plot out what that person's role and skills would be. Please note that this does not constitute an employment advertisement, but if you would like to encourage us to create the position, send a proposal to work @ livealchemy.com.

Content population on our sites

Bookkeeping and accounting

Bright-spark profiler

Marketing interest/background
Young at heart with creative edge
Aware of current internet and marketing trends. ie. must know what a blog is
Has bought something online

Yesterday I set up a few Google Alerts to monitor anything that was written on the web with phrases like “Live Alchemy”, “Ideate” and “Yuppie Chef”. The buzz at the moment seems to be around a book by Michael Levy called “The Joys of Live Alchemy“. Unfortunately the book is not about how wonderful it is to work here, or to deal with our businesses. The opening sentence is “Everything relates to nothing…” It looks a bit over my head.

We tried our best to come up with name that wouldn’t be confused with other companies, and obviously the .com needed to be available. I didn’t think to search Amazon for book titles. For more tips on naming a company, have a look at this post on Ideate.

The Big Red Cherry dished the dirt on us, so I guess we'll have to spill at least 5 of our very best kept secrets. This is part of a viral blogging thing where you post 5 little known truths about yourself, and then "tag" 3 other bloggers to do the same.

1. Live Alchemy originally started as a web profitability company.
2. Our offices are based at home, and our founders, Andrew and Shane are neighbours.
3. We don't manufacturer any of our products and we try not carry any stock. In fact we've never hoisted a flag and we've never used most of the products on YuppieChef.com
4. We've been PC users from the beginning and this year converted to Mac, even though we don't actually own one yet (any sponsors?)
5. We're saving up for a EVA SOLO CafeSolo Coffee-Maker.

Now to be silly…

The Heavy Chef
PCOW, Inc
Taste Matters

Live Alchemy is a holding company that starts and accelerates small businesses. This blog documents our journey, and hopefully provides encouragement for other small businesses in South Africa and the world.