Princess Adeyinka Tekenah is the founder of one of Nigeria’s brand indigenous premium coffee companies, Happy Coffee. She is also the convener of the Lagos Coffee Festival. Adeyinka is the first elected National President for Nigerian Women in Coffee. She is the Author of the African Coffee Creed for Women. Adeyinya continues to play a vital role in advocating for the growth of the Nigerian coffee with a major focus on creating sustainable models to empower the lives of female farmers and youths whilst tackling poverty and unemployment. She is passionate about business designs and advancement leading to sustainable growth and development for African women even as she continues to build and mentor girls and women across Nigeria’s business ecosystem
Adeyinka speaks exclusively to Sunday Oyinloye, Publisher, Green Savannah Diplomatic Cable about how she’s trying to redefine the coffee industry in Nigeria
Excerpts:
How was your growing up like?
It was great memories to last for a life time. It had loads of good and bad events like losing my dad at an early stage in life. In all, it’s part of the circle of life.
When and how did you get involved in coffee business?
I had read a book, “Pour your heart into it” back in college that stirred up my passion in the coffee business. Fast forward to 2015, the idea of Happy Coffee was birthed
Did you encounter challenges at the beginning of your coffee business, if yes how were you able to overcome those challenges?
Challenges are common with businesses, whether new or old. Data was a major challenge when we started. We didn’t have about the Nigerian coffee value chain. These challenges are still there, but we are solving them by building data as we grow to make business decisions.
What makes your brand Happy Coffee unique?
Designing coffee experiences is our key differentiator.
You got seed funding of 5000 USD from Tony Elumelu Foundation in 2015, but today, you are running a multi-million dollars business, what business strategies did you adopt to achieve that height?,
Business strategies developed at Happy Coffee focus on how to improve the production and consumption of Nigerian coffee. Looking at the Nigerian coffee value, our mission is centered on the blue print to bring Nigeria back on the global coffee map, whilst tackling social problems such as youth unemployment and financial literacy amongst women.
What are you doing to encourage coffee farmers in Nigeria?
Increasing our off taking actively will continue to encourage our coffee farmers. Currently we source all our coffee from Nigerian coffee farmers.
How comfortable are you with the coffee culture of Africans, particularly Nigerians?
There are many opportunities still untapped. However, we are building slowly but surely.
What are you doing to promote coffee culture on the continent?
Building the Happy Coffee brand is our major strategy in promoting the coffee culture.
You have been advocating for a government policy on coffee in Nigeria, why are you doing that?
Nigeria’s coffee value chain needs committed co-champions to reintegrate the country into the global coffee industry. Secondly, a national coffee policy will reposition the coffee production and processing capabilities in the country.
How do you see the coffee industry in Africa in the next ten years?
I see the African coffee value functional at an optimal capacity. This means that coffee players will be curating active solutions from production to the cup
