By MakalliMatta Consulting
Chop Shop — adding a new flair to Gambian fast-food
From an early age, Aminatou Jallow was breaking moulds and traditions imposed upon her as a woman in Gambian society. The proprietress of Chop Shop — the ever growing fast-food sensation founded in 2014 – battled many personal and professional challenges to build her brand to where it is today. From a small shop in Fajara, the restaurant has grown and expanded to three other locations. We had a chat with Aminatou to discover how Chop Shop managed to add a new and unique flair to the very difficult and saturated Gambian food industry.
The woman herself: Aminatou who moved around often as a child, spent a chunk of her childhood under her grandmother’s care in Banjul. At 17 years of age, her life took a then difficult turn when she became pregnant right after finishing Form Five at Reverend J. C Faye Memorial School. Along with dealing with the stigma attached to teenage pregnancy, Aminatou was judged and ostracized. But this did not stop her in dreaming big.
“My courage was my mom,” she says.
Her mom encouraged her to look at the situation as a phase and as motivation to strive for better.
“I had to grow up and mature faster than most people my age,” she continues, regarding the challenges she faced as a pregnant teenager. With the support of her mom, Aminatou completed International Business College. Upon earning her diploma, she went on to win the “Miss Face Gambia Beauty Pageant,” serving as an ambassador for Forum for African Women Educationalist (FAWE), promoting girl’s education and working to prevent teenage pregnancy.
After obtaining her Bachelors followed by her MBA in the United Kingdom, Aminatou returned to The Gambia and worked for the telecoms company, Comium and the now defunct PHB bank as the head of Product Development. She found that she was not professionally fulfilled by bothered roles. From our chat, we discovered that following the norm has always been a challenge for Aminatou. During her time at PHB, she would often challenge the Managing Director’s decisions and offer her own way of doing things. One day, he said to her, “Have you ever thought of being an entrepreneur? You have the mindset and skill to do something greater than this.”
Six months after she started working at PHB, Aminatou resigned. “From there I decided that I will not work for anyone else. Because I knew l would end up resigning again,” she says as she reflects on what drove her to become an entrepreneur.
Chop Shop started with the goal to fill a gap in the Gambian food industry:
“I wanted to o
pen a restaurant that would be somewhere between fine dining and fast-food. I realized that there weren’t many places like that.”
The restaurant, whose clientele is mostly working class Gambians, is known for its sweet-bun burgers, but initially Aminatou did not want her establishment to sell burgers. She got the idea for the sweet buns after having to resort to using local sweet bread for a burger she ordered during a night out. The combination of savoury and sweet was so good that she replicated it at Chop Shop and it quickly propelled the restaurant to new heights.
“The burger is what sold Chop Shop. Everywhere I looked on Facebook I saw people raving about the burger,” she says.
What sets Chop Shop apart from the rest? Aminatou credits this to her consistency and her commitment to brand development. Centralizing the food processing at Chop Shop has been key in making sure the food served is consistent across the different locations. She continues to invest in food processing machines and developed Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to ensure that customers continue to get the same quality and tasty food at any of the locations they visit.
“I care about how people feel when they come into the restaurant. That’s why every year, I put money into renovations and think about ways I can make Chop Shop better” she says.
She goes on to explain: “I always consider the brand in whatever I do. And I instill this in my staff by reminding them that they are a representation of the brand.”
Aminatou recognizes that lack of consistency and structure has been the downfall for many businesses in the country, so she has gone to great lengths to make sure Chop Shop excels in this area. While carefully reading about case studies of successful franchises such as McDonald’s, she is constantly thinking of how to solidify her brand before expanding. To the young entrepreneur, making sure she has a solid foundation and a strong brand is more important than expanding at a rapid rate.
“Whenever you’re giving someone food, you have to give it to them in the right manner,” she explains as she discusses how she trains her staff to conduct themselves. Along with emphasizing the importance of customer service to her staff, Aminatou instills in them the values of discipline and loyalty, whilst working to empower staff as well. She has developed a system that ensures that staff are able to execute their duties without much supervision from her, meaning she does not have to micromanage them. This enables Aminatou to focus her energy on other aspects of business and brand development.
Aminatou has been inspired by watching her mom work extremely hard to fund all five of her children’s education. With the implementation of her Career Spa, Aminatou offers guidance and training to young women entrepreneurs in the early stages of their development.
“No matter what stage you are in your life, challenges are going to keep coming. You just have to be prepared to face them” Aminatou says.
The young entrepreneur has faced many challenges in her life, but throughout them all, she has stood tall and remained driven in the face of adversity. Being unafraid to take risks and focusing on establishing a solid foundation; these are elements that have enabled Aminatou to establish one of the country’s most popular restaurants.
Contact Aminatou: [email protected]
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As part of of our 2018 Women’s History Month celebrations, MMC would be highlighting one Gambian woman per week engaged in mainstream business, driven by brand relevance and legacy building. We would like to see more Gambian women formalizing their businesses. We indeed recognize that the informal business sector is female dominated in Africa as a whole but for this month, we would like to inspire that young girl whose mother is a fruit seller to be inspired to be a farmer and supplier of fruit to hotels, supermarkets etc. We want women to dare to dream to be players in big business. We are already on that path but we need more of us on deck.
Happy Women’s Month!
