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Across West Africa, many depend on breakfast made from maize, sorghum and millet popularly referred to as Koko or Pap. But the concern is that it has a brief life shelf. Some additionally complain of unhygienic strategies of preparation.
A Nigerian entrepreneur has been including worth to the preparation of pap and having it bought in formal retail outlets. Oluyemisi Obe established a food processing firm referred to as Prothrive Astute Heights in 2015 to supply high-quality pap with an extended shelf life.
Obe stated she went into food processing following challenges she had getting styles of cereals to feed her youngsters once they had been infants. According to her, she then noticed it as a chance to supply a wide range of breakfast meals for different moms.
“I thought about food processing when my children were babies because each time I tried to introduce them to cereal, I would find just one variety. I realised there was an opportunity to produce something readily available to other mothers. That was how I came about the idea and the research started,” she informed How we made it in Africa.
The business started each day operations by producing 50kg of its maiden product, Grandios Pap, which was bought from the boot of Obe’s car in church buildings, mosques and different public locations. After securing regulatory approval, she marketed in supermarkets after establishing agreements with distributors and brokers.
In addition, she additionally took benefit of social media to achieve out to potential clients and in accordance with her, it will definitely paid off for her regardless of the price of advertising for small companies like hers.
“We increased the number of distributors and retailers by building our relationships. We also created an online presence through our website and social media platforms. The cost of offline marketing for small businesses is enormous, so, we had to learn how to use social media for our marketing and it has paid off,” she defined.
Seven years down the road, Obe now produces a number of tonnes to fulfill each day demand. She sells in main supermarkets in Nigeria, together with Shoprite, Spar, Ebeano, Justrite and different retailers throughout the nation.
The product can also be on the cabinets of supermarkets within the U.S. and UK identified for promoting made-in-Nigeria merchandise.
Obe is already entertaining the thought of increasing into the West African market as a part of her medium to long-term objectives. Part of her enlargement plan is to develop extra styles of the present merchandise and different conventional meals in smaller pouches for comfort, in accordance with How we made it in Africa.
Ultimately, her dream is to be listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange. “We are working on listing. I know there will come a time when I would want to retire but I want the company to continue.”
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