Vegan Store

The lack of organic food stuffs on the market and vegan/vegetarian products being expensive, leads us to think about creating a digital Vegan store, where natural food stuffs could be sold. Our plan is to partner with farmers in both rural and urban areas, encourage, train and support them to produce natural and fresh vegetables and crops which would be sold on our platform.

Creating this platform will help our community, especially vegan/vegetarian to have easy access to organic food stuffs from the comfort zone of their home and at an affordable prize.

As it is said, our food should be our medicine. Most of the Genetically Modified Organism (GMO) that we consume have many disadvantages on our health; such as allergy reactions, cancer, etc. I have witnessed over 200 people in my community and 5 people in my family who had severe digestive disorder due to the consumption of these kind of food which was produced with high carbon chemical.

In addition to this, I noticed in my country Benin Republic and Ghana (where I live), that 80% of the population find it difficult to change their diet even when they are willing to do so. Being vegan or vegetarian is seen as luxury to many; and this situation makes most of the vegan and vegetarian people in our community, have difficulties to get enough resources to nourish their body. I have noticed few months ago that the normal foods I eat cause me more harm than good; I then decided to go vegetarian and then to vegan to live more healthier. Being in contact with vegetarian and vegan in my community made me realize the struggle they go through to nourish their body perfectly.

Vegan Store is a digital grocery that sells organic food stuffs, especially for vegan and vegetarian community in west Africa. Our vision is to promote and sell natural and organic food stuffs through our platform to help the vegan community eat healthy and at less cost. Before the products land on our platform, there are some processes we take the business through.

First of all, we will have to partner with farmers who are ready to do business with us by selling their products on our platform. We will take them through online training with experts, for them to understand the danger in using high carbon in the production of their yields.

Secondly, we will have to create and launch the platform by the first quarter of 2021. 

We help farmers post their products (vegetables, fruits, cereals, seeds, etc) on our platform; when a customer places an order, we notify the supplier and package the product, once received. 

Finally our delivery service send the product to the customer's doorstep.

all these would be made within an hour time.

The main target of Vegan Store is the vegan and vegetarian community in West Africa. However, our platform could be of help to everyone. Vegans and vegetarians in my community who found it difficult to have access to their food stuffs could now get satisfy with our platform. 

Training farmers and encourage them in following the low-carbon protein option in the production of their crops will help any consumer of these products to be in good health.

Vegans and vegetarians could now have access to organic foods from the comfort zone of their home and at an affordable price. This will help our target market to eat healthy and have access to any product based on their diet.

The problem, our solution and our solution's target population relate to the challenge and our selected dimension, because we are working on promoting organic food stuffs by doing partnership with farmers and training them on the importance of using low-carbon protein in their production.

Our solution works in sustaining particular nutritious diets which are vegan and vegetarian diets in our community.  

The competitors trying to solve the same problem now are Vegan restaurants, malls/supermarkets. These competitors offer vegan and vegetarian foods, but most at an expensive cost. Most of the restaurants offer vegan dishes/recipes already made for people who belong to middle and high classes. Supermarkets and malls offer vegan food stuffs to customers who have to come to them.

The first difference or innovation in our solution is the education we provide to farmers to encourage them produce low-carbon nutritious foods. The second one is when we move to the customers with the products. Our customers can have access to organic foods from the comfort zone of their home through our digital platform and at an affordable price.

The core technology that powers my solution is a mobile application. An application downloadable on android and iPhone. This will be designed to run on mobile devices like smartphones, tablets, laptops or desktops. Our mobile application will be a digital market where vegetarian and vegan food stuffs will be sold. 

Downloading our application on your smartphone gives you direct access to our platform, which you can explore and order any food stuff of your choice, from the comfort zone of your home. We bring grocery store to your house/work place through our mobile application.

Digital store/market also called E-commerce is not a new technology. This is a common technology used in our century to facilitate selling and buying. There are so many E-commerce companies that have been working for many years in Africa and globally; some of them are Alibaba, Jumia, Tonaton, Amazon, etc. These platforms help many people around the globe to sell and/or buy the products of their choice, from the comfort zone of their home.

We intend to use the same technology to deal with farmers as our suppliers and vegans/vegetarians as our customers.

Our Activities:

We collaborate with farmers to provide healthy yield which we sell to vegan/vegetarian through our digital platform.

Outputs: 

Farmers produce low carbon nutritious food and customers get them easily through our platform.

Short term outputs:

Vegan and Vegetarian community in Ghana and Benin have easy access to their food stuffs and live healthy by consuming our products.

Long term outputs:

Vegan and Vegetarian community in West Africa has easy access to their food stuffs and live healthy by consuming our products.

Since we are currently at the idea stage, we have not yet serve anyone with our solution. The current number of the people we served is "0".

The estimated percentage of vegans/vegetarians in Accra being 405,000 which is 15% of 2,700,000 and 216,000 in Cotonou as 9% of 2,400,000. In the next one year, we intend to serve a minimum of 108,000 people in Cotonou and 202,000 people in Accra; as 50% of this community.

In the next five years, when our business would already be extended to different cities, we intend to serve a minimum of 6,000,000 people in West Africa.

Our first goal within the next year is the creation of our digital platform and the partnership with farmers in our community, from the first quarter of 2021. Use internet and/or offline courses to educate them about low carbon nutritious foods. From the second quarter of 2021, we should start operating and impacting lives of thousands of vegans/vegetarians in our community, by making products available to them at an affordable price through our platform.

In the next five years, to make more impact in the vegan/vegetarian community in West Africa, we will extend our business to other cities such as: Kumasi, Ouagadougou, Lome, Porto-Novo and Abidjan. This will help us to reach a minimum of 5,000,000 people in five years.

The barriers that currently limit my impact are:

• The expensive cost to register the business as a foreigner in Ghana;
• The lack of financial resources as capital to start building the platform;
• A weak collaboration with farmers in my community. 

In the next year, the barrier could be how to train farmers effectively and make sure they apply what they learn about low-carbon nutritious food.

In the next five years, we may encounter currency exchange rate problem, as we develop our business to other countries in West Africa.

To overcome these barriers, I will:

• make a partnership with a Ghanaian citizen who is into agriculture; that will help me register my business faster and at a lower cost;
• continue applying for opportunities that would help me to win grant as seed capital to start building my business;
• work with my partner into agriculture for us to build a strong bond with other farmers in our community;
• work with my partner to give strong training and educate farmers about low carbon nutritious food;
• operate in each country according to their economy and how their market works.

Currently, we have one member working full-time on the project, which is our CEO; and one member who works part-time (he is a partner living in Benin).

We have not taken any other workers yet.

Our team is composed of an online marketer, a programmer, an accountant, a business manager and an agribusiness expert. 

The main role of the marketers is to communicate with the audience; spread the mission of VeganStore both online and offline; manage our social media pages and generate sells. The responsibilities of our programmer include website and mobile app development, website and mobile app maintenance, overall technology efficiency and information control. The agribusiness expert in our team is a member of "FIFAMIN Addli NGO" in Benin. An NGO which is specialized in agriculture, especially the production of pineapple. Finally our accountant or Director of Finance, as the safeguard of VeganStore assets, is responsible of the financial stability of the company.

Our CEO is the founder of an online languages learning platform called "House of Languages Academy". She has the ability to manage a business both online and offline; has a digital marketing skill and a great communication skill in customer relationship.

We do not have any current organization partner; but we look forward to partner with:

• mentors, who can help with advises to reach our goals;
• experts, who can educate us with our fundraising proposals.

Vegan Store is a digital platform that provides organic vegan/vegetarian food stuffs in West Africa. We are offering vegan products online with a delivery service that will allow customers to get their goods at their door steps.

The value we create to our target market is an easy access to vegan/vegetarian products from the comfort zone of their home at an affordable prize. We will help them to eat healthy through our farmer partners yield.

We train farmers to produce a low carbon nutritious foods which we sell through our platform to keep our target market in good health.

Our potential revenue sources are:

• Commission generated on selling products on our platform;
• mobile application data;
• commission on delivery service.

I choose to apply for this program and become a solver, because I believe Solve will help me gain mentoring, can connect me with expert with whom I will take advises and guidance to develop my business. I will be able to find resources and courses related to Entrepreneurship/Business on this platform that can really help me on my journey.

All these learning/resources can help me to continue raising funds and convince investors to help me achieve my goals.

To achieve a perfect goal, Vegan Store needs to connect with a mentor who can guide them through a perfect Entrepreneurship journey. We need to learn how to raise fund to start our business and make our it financially stable/independent. 

Vegan Store needs partnership with great programmer in building the solution. 

We do not have any organizations name in mind now, but we intend to partner with solve members/previous solve winners that can guide us and give us advises to build our solution.

Members who can guide us through how to write a good proposal to raise funds through crowdfunding and others.