No Ordinary Agege Bread Seller

If the ‘Agege' bread as a variety of the much loved, universal pastry flies over your head, the name Olajumoke Orisaguna probably doesn’t. The 27 year old model and mother of two, is now so famous that there is hardly any Nigerian or anyone around the world with access to the Internet who is yet to have heard or read about her incredible story of transitioning from an unassuming ‘Agege' bread seller on the streets of Lagos to a fashion model.

By now there are probably and million and one articles about Olajumoke and yea, this one of them — only that this is more about Agege bread, the notoriously yummy, and addictive staple food in Nigeria than it is about the newly minted star.

Agege bread — so square, so yummy, and sometimes so full of bromate. Good or bad, Nigerians love a freshly baked loaf, anytime of the day - sometimes hot, but always delightly soft and ready to go with either a generous spread of butter (or blue band magerine), and a cup of tea, or real hot ‘Akara’ or sinfully tasty ‘Ewa Agoyin’ or again, a hot spicy plate of Indomie noodles. Anywhere Agege bread surfaces, there is always a starry eyed Nigerian eager to lay hold as many loaves as is necessary for daily bread. So you see that beyond Olajumoke’s stunning looks in that first photo that launched her new life, people were probably also thirsting after that tray of bread that literally promises life.

The prophet, on the other hand, is usually without honour in the eyes of her own people. Agege bread sellers are ‘ordinary' in the eyes of Nigerians. Look no further for evidence than the numerous variations of online comments that read something like, ‘check out this amazing story of Olajumoke the ordinary Agege bread seller turned model’. This wide spread perception is hardly far removed from the cheapness and ubiquity of the famous square loaves. Our ordinary Agege bread sold by ordinary Agege bread sellers are likely to be baked round the clock in at least one bakery on every other street in Nigeria .

Now, cheap and readily available are two pillars of the Agege bread industry — which, by the way must remain constant unless you intend to see the ‘red eyes' of Nigerians . Our red eyes in event of any unbecoming news of possible exclusivitity due to price could be something akin to the legend of the uproar in France in 1700s before the birth of their much loved ‘baguette’ — “du pain d’égalité”. You get the picture now, the Agege bread is to Nigeria, as baguette is to France. The bread for the rich and poor alike.

However, while these factors — price and availability remains as is, is there perhaps a way to make Agege bread sellers a little less ordinary? You know perhaps, some radically useful technology, innovative service or process improvement that could make the formidable wooden tray balancing squad assume more value to us than we care ascribe to them now?

It could be that there are things that need some improvement, and on the flip side, maybe nothing at all. But is there anything under the sun that can’t do with some improvement? One imagines that even the Agege bread industry and its value chain if analysed and considered vis-a-vis the pain points of bakers, sellers and consumers, can be greatly improved upon.

So, Agege bread innovation, or hack anyone?

Now, because one is all for sustainable disruptive innovation, one’s thoughts are in the direction of solutions that do not take the Olajumoke’s off ‘street to street' service per se, but helps them make better turn over on sales and better satisfy Nigerian’s ever healthy appetite for their beloved square loaves.

If you have any ideas about innovating within the Agege bread industry — you know, re-imagining the seemingly ordinary, please drop a comment. This could be an opportunity for a session of useful online brainstorming / hacking.

This article was written by Jolaade for @alljoineducation.

alljoineducation is an online social innovation network and platform focused on creating an ecosystem for collaboration, knowledge flow, skills development and innovation across African countries and the world.

We are currently building our founder team. Email us — alljoineducation@gmail.com if you’d like join the team.

Also, we are on Instagram as @alljoineducation and on Twitter as @aj_education, please feel free to follow us ☺

PS: first image credit — via Nwabundo Chika Okoh (Facebook); second image credit — Unknown (we would love to credit the original creator)

©alljoineducation 2016