Inside One Of The UK’s Biggest African Supermarkets 🇬🇧 | The Akandes’ Success Story

Added: 2026-05-15

[00:00:00]All right, live in Birmingham.

[00:00:02]All right now, so yeah, it's Tommy's, man. These guys, like we said, killing it, doing this amazing stuff all over the world, especially here in in Birmingham and across the UK. So, me and my guys have come and we want to experience it.

[00:00:17]>> [music] [music] >> Woo!

[00:00:30]My people. Hi, yeah. How are you?

[00:00:32]>> What's up, babe?

[00:00:33]Oh, you're welcome.

[00:00:34]We are fooling. Oh, wow. We are fooling.

[00:00:36]Oh, wow.

[00:00:38]I'm going to start now.

[00:00:39]I did. What's up, babe? What's up?

[00:00:42]>> [music] >> So, they're going to show us products made by them, other products they've got. And we're just going to go around and get a good feel of how this is and give you a better idea how this thing is. So, come on, man. Let's go.

[00:00:58]>> [music] >> Every week, you have free supplies of it.

[00:01:05]Every week, Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays. Wow. That's fresh food.

[00:01:08]>> That's tetee. I know. Shoko. That's it.

[00:01:10]Oh, that's good.

[00:01:12]>> [laughter] >> As I told you now.

[00:01:14]Ewa moin moin. Oh my god.

[00:01:18]Wow. Um No, no, no, no. I'm fine. This is useful. This is useful.

[00:01:24]Utazi. Uziza.

[00:01:27]Uziza. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know that [laughter] one.

[00:01:30]Wow. That's for oha. Yeah, for oha. I know. I know. I know this is what people should know. When you see, when you eat African food, that's why sometimes you say we got energy, we got strong cuz it's all natural green food.

[00:01:42]Everything's natural. Look at that.

[00:01:44]These are all roots and tubers and vegetables and that's it, man. Your scotch bonnet. Yeah, look at all that.

[00:01:50]This I know it's it's Uganda. It's from Uganda. You see, I know those things. Oh my goodness. I love to cook. I'm a foodie. I'm a foodie about food. Oh, yeah.

[00:02:01]Fufu. Fufu. Oh, my god.

[00:02:03]This one with okra soup is heaven. It just You just remember home.

[00:02:08]>> [screaming] >> A call. Oh, god.

[00:02:14]>> [laughter] >> Wow. This is heaven. Wow. The way you feel February there and you have this with pepper This is egg and egg. Even garden. Even garden egg.

[00:02:24]>> Egg and garden egg.

[00:02:26]Guys, you guys got everything here, man.

[00:02:28]When we moved here, this was our first >> [music] >> and only cold room freezer. This one here. Just there. Yeah. And after a while we built an extension.

[00:02:37]Wow. So, that's like cold room. Yeah, cold room freezer.

[00:02:43]That's your guy. That's your model.

[00:02:44]That's your super model.

[00:02:46]And you see the super model there.

[00:02:48]Imagine a superstar. Please, can we sign an autograph?

[00:02:51]>> [laughter] >> So, yeah. Obviously from the back, some of the ones that you've seen, the ones that are like um smoked and all that.

[00:02:56]So, we have them in like fillet.

[00:02:59]Like the catfish, shower, barracuda, um stockfish. Yeah. And then we do them in different sizes because people like to buy big, they like to buy small.

[00:03:09]They have all the prawns, the crayfish, ground, [music] old ground, everything smoked fish.

[00:03:16]And another one.

[00:03:17]Wow. Look at that. The popular product.

[00:03:21]That's fish, by the way.

[00:03:23]>> [laughter] >> So, we have product of African Old African. And both of them are trademarks. What's the What's the difference? Why?

[00:03:30]So, the Old African is like a JV with a with a popular uh business in London called Adede's.

[00:03:37]Adede's, okay. And so, we we we're partnering and sort of we we kind of want to grow that line that we know is we know how we source, ethically source.

[00:03:49]And all of that because there's a lot of products that obviously bigger companies have sort of gone into.

[00:03:54]But, and they've all come into the space.

[00:03:58]You know, presenting African food to us.

[00:04:00]But, we're saying we're Africans. Our taste, our spices, we know better. How we can, you know, make better. So, and that's what we're kind of building and then create our own brand line and then we're hoping to expand as we go.

[00:04:13]>> [music] >> Turkey, chicken, fish, everything. So, so essentially we're in an Asda of African foods. Yeah, pretty much. And the brilliant thing is part of part of So, part of what we call our sauce product. So, this is also our brand.

[00:04:33]You know, so we have companies that we're working with that are supplying us directly.

[00:04:37]Um from Vietnam, from China. And that's tilapia on there.

[00:04:42]Um you have your shrimps.

[00:04:45]Also our brand.

[00:04:50]It's fresh. Part of Africa.

[00:04:52]What we're working hard on is getting this into um a lot of shops around.

[00:04:56]Already they're in shops, they're in shops in London, and shops in all um locally around us and everything else.

[00:05:05]And the whole idea again is just convenience. So, this is a foil roll. And the beautiful thing is this is all approved. You look at it. That's our approval number.

[00:05:15]So, all the things that we do, we make sure that we do it to guidelines and everything. All your allergens and everything, everything that you need to you know, to look at Yeah, good to go. This is probably going to give you two or three servings. Yeah.

[00:05:29]And then you're good to go.

[00:05:30]>> How long How long would that last? Like before they expire that you can So, it's frozen. Frozen like up to what? A year.

[00:05:38]But, obviously the instruction is once it's defrosted, don't refreeze and then consume it within three to five days.

[00:05:44]Hair extensions as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They got hair yeah. I didn't only food now.

[00:05:49]>> [laughter] >> They sold the sold I eat the food must look good. Must look good, yeah.

[00:05:53]Exactly, now. Wow. So, that's what you get and then you have all the colors.

[00:05:57]Yeah, this is Brazilian extensions.

[00:06:00]But, but the reason why I like this is like a one a one-stop shop. As I was saying, it's a nice style of African food, like, you know, that's it. So, we we have toiletries, we do toiletries, you can get your roll-on, you can get your body wash, you can get your toothpaste, toothbrush. We sell Paco. You see Paco?

[00:06:16]Paco? You know Paco that I use? Chewing stick. So, here we've got all the garri and all the other stuff.

[00:06:20]>> Yeah, so all of this all of this are um again, they're products that we source bring from Nigeria and then we bring them in and then we repackage them. Again, because we put it in this because we trust our source and that's the only way we can defend. One of our one of our cliche is that um we are responsible and we stand by everything that we sell. All these are also black African American products.

[00:06:45]Yeah. Black products. Yeah.

[00:06:47]Hair products from here, too. Cuz we know we know our skin, we know our what do you call it? Our dermatology.

[00:06:52]Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is true. We know how to work our own skin. We know our It's a black-based products. Yeah. So, this is this is honey beans, they call it awolowo. Cuz I'm twin I'm twin, by the way, if you guys don't know. So, I remember growing up on my birthdays, you know, when you guys will have chicken and rice and all this thing. This is what they cook for our birthday, beans.

[00:07:10]It's good for twins, it's a kind of like, you know, symbolic very for twins, so we always have Oh, yeah, this is just a obviously this is the showcase of a lot of um meats and poultry products, you know?

[00:07:23]You have your jumbo hot chicken, you have your turkey wings, turkey drumsticks, um the smoked one.

[00:07:30]And then you have the boma. You know, you talked about boma. So, you have the you have the traditional like that smoked boma that you do. Okay.

[00:07:39]This is proper live cat catfish, yeah?

[00:07:41]>> Yeah. Wow, look at that.

[00:07:43]Look at that.

[00:07:45]>> [laughter] >> That's proper live catfish. So, in Nigeria sometimes when you go to when you go to like pepper soup joints, there's something they call point and kill. So, essentially what it means is that they have a pool like that where the fish is swimming. So, essentially you go, have a look, and then point at the one you want. And then right before you, they grab it into the soup, and in 5 10 minutes you got a nice pot of pepper soup with rice.

[00:08:11]Alcohol, gouda, whatever. It's You don't want to miss that. Try it whenever you go to Nigeria. Next time you go to Nigeria, make sure point and kill.

[00:08:17]Yeah, Ghanaian gear.

[00:08:19]Ghanaian sauce.

[00:08:24]So, it's we cut across we cut across a lot of people um down the house somewhere there we have the >> [laughter] >> You know what? You could actually lock me up in your house, but just go.

[00:08:41]>> [laughter] >> Original African Nigerian palm oil. You know what I mean? Like The mothers. Now, the mothers, this is their this is all their locations. This, what do we have here?

[00:08:51]>> [screaming] >> Chicken shawarma, beef beef suya, and you have shawarma.

[00:08:57]No, no, see I I I literally can tell right now that this is like this is the best shawarma spot in the UK today. Like it is in the UK today. I'm not kidding. Who authorized that claim? No, me.

[00:09:09]>> [laughter] >> Very as a very This is This is acclaimed. In Birmingham right now, everybody that has tried it have gone back and come back. So, these are like we call them reefers, but they're like containers.

[00:09:21]They're not freezers. Every single one of them has products from the back to the end all filled up. So, from here all the products we use in the shop and for online.

[00:09:33]All this down I get that. Yeah. These are all yours?

[00:09:36]>> Yeah, freezers. And everything is full, full to the brim. Wow. After all of >> [laughter] [laughter] [laughter] >> So, this is the packaging section of the business.

[00:11:38]They're done for the day. And that's where you get all the products.

[00:11:41]I come in potato flakes.

[00:11:45]The peeled beans. Peeled beans, black-eyed beans, honey beans.

[00:11:51]The garries, the plantain flowers. So, they package everything here. Yeah, everything here.

[00:11:58]It's amazing, man. I think what's left now is to go chop the abula now. Yes.

[00:12:03]Let's go chop the abula. Let's see.

[00:12:05]Let's go.

[00:12:11]>> [music] >> Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're welcome to Empress. Why? Empress bar. Yeah, this is Bamians Delight, you know.

[00:12:22]Bamians Delight? Bamians Delight, oh.

[00:12:24]Serving you the best and the best abula.

[00:12:27]That's your specialty? And the best puff puff. And the best puff puff.

[00:12:31]>> And the best everything.

[00:12:32]And the best everything. And the best everything. And the best everything.

[00:12:36]Just So, what what are we going to have, Kenny? Ah, now we talked about the abula now. No, I would like the abula, yes. And maybe the puff puff, too.

[00:12:45]>> [music] [music] >> Let's leave the puff puff aside.

[00:12:55]Main course now. Let's get Let's get down to the main thing. How we do in Africa. And I handle all that.

[00:13:01]Oh, there we go. You got no more grass today. Look at all that.

[00:13:04]>> [laughter] >> On the origin things, we are now.

[00:13:09]This is how we do it typically.

[00:13:11]I know Rose wants to go for the cutleries and fork and knife and all that.

[00:13:15]But we know the every now. That is how I enjoy. So, first of all, obviously, you wash your hands. You wash your hand properly.

[00:13:22]Cuz you're dipping your hands in it. We going natural here, man. It's all natural natural. That's how Africa is.

[00:13:27]That's how we grew up in Africa, man.

[00:13:29]You got to use your hands. You know what I mean? I'd love to use my hands, too.

[00:13:33]But you all but you babe you ain't babe.

[00:13:35]You ain't babe. I'm not doing babe things, so. Yeah, I know. But before I eat mine, I want to let you know something. The omiok babe is beautiful.

[00:13:45]I'll show you I'll show you exactly how we do it. So, you do it.

[00:13:49]There you go.

[00:13:52]That's how you do it, man.

[00:13:54]Are you getting the real flavor?

[00:13:55]>> [laughter] >> You got that?

[00:13:59]Oh, brilliant, man. What an amazing, amazing tour. You know, tour of the empire. Empire that is sammies and empresses and all that. Huge logistics and planning, man. Yeah, we we we do our bit in the society, especially in diaspora.

[00:14:15]And it's very important that, you know, we're recognized for our hard work.

[00:14:18]We're recognized even for our contribution.

[00:14:21]You know, some of us you know I know you have your crew, you know, you know, the people that obviously you're providing for, as well, that they can take care of the family. Same thing with us, we have the the workforce that we have and all of that. And then, however big or small, we're also contributing to the economy of this country. And then, you know, we all deserve a pat on the back. So, Well done, guys. Everybody's doing really great. Ooh, I love I really, really love what you touched on now.

[00:14:47]We're not just doing it to to to survive. We're not just doing it to inspire ourself, but we're building the economy.

[00:14:56]>> [music] [music] [music] >> They can't really do anything. So, OYET Foundation, we've come to kind of help these parents to know that