Shop AWEC Businesses This Giving Season and Empower an African Woman Entrepreneur

Investing in women is smart business. Women are more likely to start businesses focused on sustainability, deliver twice as much revenue per dollar invested, employ more women and their enterprises perform better over time.

At AWEC, we’ve been betting on African women entrepreneurs since day one. We continue to see examples every day of the ways in which they contribute directly to their local economies, provide innovative solutions to challenges in their communities, and generate job opportunities and revenue for their neighbors and peers. 

Socially Conscious Gifting This Holiday Season

One of the most direct and sustainable ways to support African women entrepreneurs is to shop from their businesses. There are more than 1,000 of them in the AWEC community and we wish we could feature them all. Below, we’ve curated a short list of a few of the gifts we love from the AWEC Alumnae business community. 

FITNESS

TNYOU (The New You) Fitness was born after the birth of Tracey’s first daughter. She perceived that she still looked pregnant after several weeks, so she researched and experimented with different lifestyle changes that ensured she got rid of the excess weight and flattened her tummy. When she returned to work, her colleagues were so amazed at her transformation they enlisted her help, and TNYOU Fitness was born. Tracy’s business offers post-pregnancy weight loss and maintenance and lifestyle fitness programs. Starting with very few clients in 2015, the business has seen growth to more than 500 clients from over 10 different countries.

Write Your Way to Fitness With The New You Journal

TNYOU is all about lifestyle transformation. The TNYOU Journal is a great tool to help individuals document and track progress along their health and fitness journey. Not only does it allow customers to manage goals, meal-plans and workout routines, it also provides in-depth goal-setting prompts that help individuals create a detailed vision for their fitness success and breaks down the steps to achieve it.

FOOD

Ebun Feludu is the Founder & CEO of JAM The Coconut Food Company - an integrated coconut processing company in Nigeria committed to building the biggest coconut brand in Africa for Africans. JAM produces a range of premium coconut products, from coconut oil, activated coconut charcoal, coconut flakes, and coconut cinnamon balls to luxurious body oils and more.

Ebun is committed to developing the coconut value chain and employing women, the backbone of the coconut industry. Since starting JAM The Coconut Food Company in 2016, Ebun has built the company to become the leading coconut brand in Nigeria with the highest number of certified products and the widest national reach. 

Boost Your Memory With Coconut Fuel

The company’s top sellers include the JAM Coconut Flakes, made from the sweet flesh of mature coconuts, finely grated, slightly sweetened and baked in low heat until golden brown and the Coconut Cinnamon Balls - the tastiest guilt free snacks one will encounter. Each ball is made from the finest coconuts, sourced from Badagry and across the coast of West Africa. The juicy white flesh of the coconut is blended with spices, rolled, and baked to perfection.

When tech-consultant Uzoamaka (Uzo) struggled to find locally-made good quality chocolate for the cake-baking side-hustle she started, she decided to explore and pursue an opportunity within the cocoa-bean sector. She launched Loom Craft Chocolate, a cocoa processing company that transforms Nigerian-grown cocoa beans into delicious craft chocolate and cocoa products that are made using locally sourced, wholesome ingredients (no chemical additives) that suit the lifestyles and diets of health- conscious consumers.

Indulge Your Sweet Tooth With a Guilt-Free Chocolate Spree

Loom’s beautiful range of thoughtfully crafted chocolate is made using cocoa-beans sourced from local regions of Nigeria, as well as locally-grown ingredients like coffee, sesame, cashew and ginger. 
A customer favorite is the 70% Dark Chocolate Bar; made from Nigerian cocoa beans, this classic bar is a Loom Craft Chocolate bestseller and suitable for vegans. Uzo also recommends the Sweet Vanilla Coffee Chocolate Bar, a not-quite-white chocolate bar made with Nigerian-grown Arabica coffee and the most deliciously fragrant Madagascar vanilla beans.

FASHION / LIFESTYLE

Born and raised in Morocco, Dounia Bounahmidi imagined Folks & Tales to fulfill three passions: design, social impact and cultural blending. She has always been secretly obsessed with visual arts and wanted to express her vision through unique products, drawing inspiration from her cultural roots as well as her travels. Folks & Tales reinvents traditional textile crafts and designs while empowering local communities throughout Morocco. Each one of their collections embodies a different technique and story.

Furnish Your Home With a Touch of North Africa

Folks and Tales have partnered with a number of skilled artisans from different communities who specialize in traditional hand weaving with the finest cotton and wool.
In their catalog of top-seller products is the Afer Lumber Pillow, handwoven from high-quality sheep wool in the purest tradition; it is designed to showcase ultimate sophistication, beauty and simplicity. The Illy Lumber Pillow, woven from organic wool shorn from local sheep by Berber women in the heart of the Atlas Mountains, will bring a hint of boho-chic to any interior.

Daphne Kasambala is on a mission to create route-to-market opportunities for creative artisans across the continent of Africa. As Founder & CEO of Meekono, she set up a B2B (Business to Business) wholesale marketplace connecting sellers and buyers of premium quality African handcrafted products. 

Meekono translates to hand in Swahili. This e-commerce platform is revolutionizing the way producers in the creative, handicrafts, textiles and apparel sectors connect with international commercial buyers. 

Inspired by African art, culture and design, everything in this Malawi and UK-registered company is handmade using sustainably sourced materials. 

Celebrate Culture and Diversity by Adding African Handmade Decor to Your Home

Wholesale buyers can discover and buy artisan-made, ethically produced and eco-friendly crafts from all across the continent. The beautiful Bespoke Binny Hot Water Bottle and Bespoke Binny Lampshades are high quality eclectic homeware pieces, hand-crafted in vibrant Africa-inspired wax print patterns that add a unique and vibrant feel to any home.

BEAUTY & COSMETICS COLLABORATION

Growing up as a young girl, Victorine was teased for her dark skin complexion and credits a simple lipstick/balm that she used with making her feel safe and confident in herself and her own beauty. She reasoned that if a simple product such as a lipstick could have such a positive effect on her, she would try with her own company to help other women to feel confident and take control of their lives. She launched Lyvv Cosmetics, a beauty company that sells 100% organic cosmetics with a focus on women of color.  

Christabel Ofori, a Ghanaian chemical engineer and cosmetic formulator, launched her company FlocareBeauty when her first born baby reacted to the products she was using for his skin. Shea butter seemed to help, but she struggled to find it in the market. FlocareBeauty, a natural skin and hair care products brand, tackles this challenge. They create high quality, natural and organic products that help mothers nourish their babies' delicate skin and rejuvenate their own skin and hair.

Partnering Their Way to Natural Skin Care

Bringing their skills and expertise together, Victorine and Christabel collaborated to create Lyvv Skin, a brand new natural skincare line with its two 5-star products: The Biphase Cleanser and the Face Serum.

Lyvv Skin products, including their packaging, are 100% organic, eco-friendly, biodegradable, sustainable and sourced from the continent.

FUN

Funmi, a geographer and travel business executive, is the founder and CEO of TVP Adventures, a travel company she started in 2016 to simplify travel to and across Africa. She wanted to create a service that made travel easy, hassle-free and memorable without costing a fortune. Her experience has opened up opportunities for her to work with several countries, tourism boards, airlines and hospitality brands to design tourism master plans and develop emerging businesses in the tourism and hospitality spaces.

At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and in the wake of the global outrage after the death of George Floyd in the U.S., Funmi decided to design games that would broaden knowledge on African people around the world. With Black Lives Matter protests and stories of violence against African Americans, the young entrepreneur found a way to share more positive information about the continent, spotlighting its people, and achievements. 

Discover the Continent from the Comfort of Your Home

Funmi designs games and puzzles that help people discover the world around them while having fun. With distribution to over 20 countries worldwide, the games are all about celebrating and spreading information about the African race and highlighting its impact globally. The flagship game is Fill in the Black, a hilarious guessing game that celebrates blackness around the world and  Fill in the Map, a fun and educative map puzzle that brings the world to kids.

Supporting Africa’s Change-makers Contributes to the Growth of Continent

Anyone who has ever tried to transfer funds or ship a package across borders understands that it’s no small feat, and we are especially proud to feature these AWEC businesses who have established global e-commerce capabilities. Tracey, Ebun, Uzoamaka, Dounia, Daphne, Victorine, Christabel, and Funmi provide a wide range of gift options for everyone on your holiday shopping list, and a purchase from one of these AWEC alumna has the added benefit of supporting a small business owner and contributing to the growth of the African economy.