The Great Uganda Supply Run: Negotiating Prices, Beating Shortages, and the Quest for A5 Notebooks
- Ric
- Oct 30
- 7 min read
Logistics can be a beast, especially when running an international mission. The past few months, from July to October 2025, have been a whirlwind of planning, purchasing, price negotiations, foreign exchange mishaps, and a high-stakes scavenger hunt for essential school supplies across Uganda. It’s been a challenging, but ultimately successful, push to get materials into the hands of children who need them.
Here’s a look behind the curtain at how we navigated the complex process of getting books, pens, and hygiene supplies to our partner schools.
Early Wins & Avoiding Shortages
Our purchasing strategy started strong in August, focusing on getting great value and staying ahead of the common supply shortages.
Toilet Paper Triumph: On August 11, we managed to secure toilet paper at a fantastic rate—UGX 6,000 per pack of 24—a significant drop from the last year's price of UGX 8,000. That’s a direct saving we can put back into programming! We solidified our partnership with Shreeji, our preferred material supplier, who offered great costs and became the foundation of our purchasing plan.
Pencil Predicament Solved: Remembering the costly pencil shortage we faced last year—which led to a $600 loss on low-quality materials, we decided to buy early. Henry found a good-quality competitor, and we purchased ahead of schedule on August 29. The total transfer, including a small $6.00 fee for the motorcycle taxi, was $1,080 USD.
About Henry Katinda - the CEO of Henjo Safari's and Empathy Children Initiative, he has become Dear Future's best and most hard working partner. He has worked with us for 4 years to complete purchases and deliver materials, including hygienic pads. We are currently working together to build his dream: Empathy High School - a nonprofit secondary school for children in remote east Uganda. Short of officially naming Henry our volunteer Operations Director in East Africa; Henry's focus is in making a difference in the communities he calls home; though his work extends far into other Ugandan kingdoms, not just his own.
The FOREX Fumble and the Power of Quotes
Not every step was smooth. On September 12, a small, but annoying, error in calculation meant I had to send an additional $50.22 to Katinda. The culprit? An outdated exchange value in my spreadsheet.
Lesson Learned: Always perform a Foreign Exchange (FOREX) check immediately before sending cash, and where possible, send the UGX amount to let the transfer service handle the current exchange rate.
Despite this hiccup, Katinda was instrumental in saving us money. By gathering two additional quotes, we discovered we could purchase rulers and crayons from a different supplier than Shrejji, saving the mission about $300! It was a great reminder that while consolidating with a preferred supplier is efficient, getting multiple quotes is always worth the effort.
The Great A5 Notebook Scramble
The initial purchases of A4 books, art books, graph books, pens, erasers, sharpeners, mathematical sets, and chalk went well on October 6. But a major challenge quickly emerged: A5 notebooks (the largest bulk of our purchase) were out of stock at Shrejji, and the shop manager wasn't confident in the promised Saturday restock for all 23,000 notebooks.
The situation turned frustrating on October 7 when Shrejji confirmed the A5 notebooks wouldn't be ready for another two weeks.
This kicked off a high-stakes search:
I enlisted the help of Patience, Henry’s sister, to call other Shrejji locations and even a supplier I'm less keen on, Picfare (more expensive and less caring to negotiate).
Faced with the immediate need to fulfill deliveries, we purchased 1,440 units of A5 notebooks from Picfare on October 7, and another 2,016 units on October 8. While Picfare is a more expensive brand, we couldn’t afford the delay. We had to break our rule and buy in smaller, more expensive increments to keep the delivery schedule on track; yet giving Shrejji the opportunity to restock. Purchasing all the books from Picfare was not a smart option.
Partnering to End Period Poverty
The same day, October 8th, I had a fantastic opportunity to visit the AFRIpads headquarters to pick up 350 packs of their reusable hygiene pads. It's always a treat to meet people working with a mission as powerful as eliminating period poverty. Meeting with Annet and Daniel was incredibly helpful; their customer service is top-notch, treating customers big or small like us with the same level of care and support.
In the following days we visited Luubu primary and Patience taught a class on menstrual health, how to use, wash and dry reusable hygienic AFRIpads, and she also touched on other topics such as early pregnancy, early marriage, HIV/AIDS and the changes that come from becoming a teen.
Delivery, Setbacks, and the Road Trip
The first week of October was a blur of deliveries, nearly all of which were a success, getting supplies to Wisdom Elementary, Shalom, and Trey Jr.
October 9: I prepared packages, but a meeting with Henry about leftover materials was cancelled when he had to tend important personal matters. The supplies would have to wait.
October 10: The day involved a full venture to Henry’s apartment to pick up the delayed pencils, rulers, and toilet paper and drop off materials for Eastern Uganda, followed by a full delivery day at Shalom Jr., and a late-night trip back to Picfare for more A5 notebooks (21 boxes this time) for Western Uganda.
October 11 (My Birthday!): After a quick vehicle repair, I organized materials, especially hygienic pads—and packed the vehicle in preparation for the journey East.
The Eastern & Western Uganda Run
The next few days were all about getting the supplies where they needed to go.
October 12 (Eastern Uganda): Despite arriving in Mayuge feeling unwell (thankfully, a simple rest and two showers solved it!), I delivered futbol gear to the orphanage. This was a highlight to the trip!
Two months prior I reached out to Pablo Dasilva from Pablo Futsal Academy and asked if he'd be willing to collaborate with me in filling up a couple 50 lb. bags full of gear; I meant shorts, shirts, cleats, etc. Pablo agreed and we collected a ton of great stuff.
Why? On a previous trip I took with me a few uniforms from my son's soccer team, between his items and another friends we had a few matching kits to give away, and when we did, the kids went crazy!! It was really great to see and to bring happiness to kids that are wearing clothes many years old.
October 13 (Luubu Primary): We successfully distributed reusable pads to a school with 1,300 students. We only had enough for 350 of the 400 eligible girls, meaning a future purchase is required. We also committed to giving teachers a six-pack each—a proven strategy for creating strong allies in education.
Girls at Luubu Primary received AFRIpads 
On the Banks of Lake Albert October 15 (Western Uganda): After returning back to Kampala, and resting one night I departed to distribute materials for 1,000 children to a community near Kagadi in the west. I approved a small dilution of the supplies (from 6 books per child to 4 books) to reach 1,500 children, provided no further dilution occurred. The day also included a visit to one of our most remote beneficiary schools on the banks of Lake Albert in the Great Western Rift Valley, accessible only by motorbike or a very daring ride!
To be clear, we have never before delivered to this school but our partner Elly Guard Tumusiime wanted to show me where he was delivering to; and his choice was spot on!
About Elly Guard - brother of my very first friend in Uganda, we were introduced two years ago, because as Timothy had shared (my friend) his brother was working for his community. Later I found out that he was the LC1 (Local Council 1) which is sort of a Mayor for the community and he is in the run for LC5, which is the highest position in the region. But what is most special about Elly Guard, is his absolute devotion to helping the needy. For years he has created a supporting group of multinational donors that help him care for children with cancer, burns, other sickness; he has rescued children from abduction, and helped many women and men from very sad situations. His focus as I see is children and his heart has no size. His family, led by a father pastor, has placed in the world 11 brothers and sisters that care for others.
The drive out of the Kagadi district was made challenging as soon as a strong storm presented itself; street lighting or lack of plus simply driving in Uganda is made twice as difficult at night and the weather only exacerbates the problem; but I safely arrived at my hotel after a 3 hour drive near the national Chimp park of Kibale.
Mission Accomplished (Almost!)
By October 17, we dropped off the last remaining pencils and rulers at Hilco Wisdom Primary and made the final material drop-off of the mission to Henry’s house.
This part of the mission officially came to a close on October 18. I met with Katinda, transferred the cash to purchase the remaining, much-needed A5 notebooks for the Mayuge region (we're hoping Shrejji is finally stocked soon!), and gave him the AFRIpads 6-packs for the teachers at Shalom and Luubu.
From price negotiations on UGX 6,000 toilet paper to complex foreign exchange calculations and last-minute scrambles for notebooks, this mission highlights the complex realities of procurement in the field. But with a dedicated team and flexibility, we successfully completed the bulk of our material distribution, bringing quality supplies to thousands of children across Uganda.
The win will show this coming February as students in the schools we support start the school year with materials in hand.
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