In this article, we tell you about Eugene Mbugua profile including education, career, big break, TV shows alongside businesses and awards.
To begin with, Eugene Mbugua content creator, writer, producer and director and founder Young Rich Television Ltd.
Eugene Mbugua can be remembered as the youngest producer (22) with a show on Kenyan national television when his show,Young Rich, premiered on K24.
At just 30, Mbugua has made a name for himself as one of the wealthiest Kenyans under the age of 40, raking fortunes in entertainment, real estate, beef farming, advertising and publishing, as well as television.
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Background & Education
Eugene Mbugua was born in November 1990.
Records show the Mbugua went to high school at Upper Hill School in Nairobi between 2005 and 2008. It is from here that he proceeded to the United States International University (USIU).
He graduated with a degree in Journalism and Television Production in 2013.
Career
Literally rising from rags to riches, Eugene Mbugua rose from poverty stricken life to to a life of opulence he now leads.
Several outlets report Mbugua struggling as a student, juggling classes and side hustles as to make money.
Between 2009 and 2013, he worked as a director at Tunawashow Junior Media at a time he was a student at USIU.
He had a stint as a film teacher at Makini School between February 2010 and November 2012. He made it to work all this time walking all the way from Roysambu to Makini. He did not have any money for bus fare.
Big Break
As he would walk or commute from Roysambu to Makini, he got to learn that some of the properties along the way belonged to young people who had made it in life. That is where he got his first idea of a show.
The show was called Young Rich, and featured millionaires in Kenya under the age of 40 talking about about business and how they made their money.
“Taking the back routes, I would see all these huge homes and young people driving expensive cars.
“I remember when I saw a ‘To Let’ advert for Sh70,000, it baffled me how anyone could spend that much on rent alone. I was curious about how these people had made their money, so I created a show around the topic,” he said during an interview with the Standard in 2019.
He pitched the show to several media houses and it was later picked up by K24 TV. The first episode aired in 2013, on the eve of his graduation from USIU.
“I made Ksh1 million in the first month, with K24 paying a licensing fee of Sh250,000 per episode. It ran for nine seasons,” Mbugua revealed.
TV Shows
Eugene Mbugua is credited for creating and or producing some television shows among them Young Rich, Get in The Kitchen, Our Perfect Wedding, Stori Yangu, My Friend, Being Bahati, Foods of Kenya and The Best of.
These shows have aired on K24, KTN, NTV, Maisha Magic East, Showmax, Iflix, Kwese, Startimes, and Trigger.
Young Rich TV is also the producer of Sol Family, a reality television series on award-winning music group, Sauti Sol.
Businesses
Knowing the poverty he came from, the young entrepreneur has vowed never to go back to the life he lived in his former years.
“I’ve been poor before, I don’t want to be poor again. As long as I see poverty behind me, I’ll always be running ahead,” Citizen Digital reported in an interview in August 2020.
As to his business ventures, Mbugua is the managing director of the Number 7 club and bar in Nairobi CBD and Number 7 Lion in Westlands.
He is also the CEO of a publishing enterprise called My Yearbook Kenya Ltd, which publishes yearbooks for schools, companies, and also the government.
Other businesses are a feedlot in Isinya, Kajiado County which he runs alongside his friends. Here, they purchase bulls and fatten them for a period of 12 weeks to become premium beef before selling them off.
Awards
Eugene Mbugua has received several accolades for his work.
To start us off, in 2014, Mbugua was listed by Business Daily among Kenya’s male Top 40 under 40 entrepreneurs. In the same year, he was crowned best editor at the Kalasha Awards for his work on the film Child for Hire.
The awards kept coming and in 2016 Forbes listed Mbugua among the 30 most promising entrepreneurs under the age of 30 in Africa. The following year 2017, he featured in Forbes Africa Top 30 under 30 entrepreneurs.
Other than producing, Eugene is among the panel of judges for the annual Riverwood Awards.
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