I produce organic food for children –Debo Adebayo, CEO Tomi’s Treats

Founder of organic baby food company, Tomi’s Treats, Mrs Debo Adebayo, is a Surrey University graduate of chemical engineering, chartered engineer as well as member of the Institute of Chemical Engineers.

She has had a 10-year stint in the oil and gas sector as a process engineer and project manager working for organizations like Foster Wheeler, KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton, as well as Amec Oil and Gas with assignments in Azerbaijan, Nigeria, Libya and the UK. She’s also a custodian of an MBA degree she obtained from Cass Business School in the UK. In this interview, she spoke about her passion for introducing organic fruit and vegetables into infants diet at a young age and why it’s always worth taking a risk in business if you believe in an idea. Excerpts:


Tell us about your journey into incorporating Tomi’s Treat?
I am passionate about kids’ health and launched Tomi’s Treats to bring organic fruit
and vegetables to enrich children’s diet. The idea was conceived when I was working on
my MBA. Our infant formula is popular in the UK and good for working mothers who
don’t really have time to be mashing and doing organic cooking themselves. Before I left the
UK for Nigeria, I investigated to see if there was any Nigerian company already into organic
infant formula but I found none. My mind was thus made up.
It’s been over a year since you launched your business. How is your product
doing in the market?
Tomi’s Treats is organic fruit and vegetable puree formulat­ed for infants of 6 months plus. Our product has no chemicals or sugars added to it. It’s com­pletely healthy and supplies recommended essential fruits and vegetables. It’s currently in mango, banana, apple and pear flavours with new ranges in the pipeline. Our formula is ideal for weaning babies and also serves as healthy snacks for children. My children take them in their lunch packs and also parents use them in their children’s party packs. Children’s nurseries are becoming very health conscious and currently stock our prod­ucts. We supply to specific mar­kets/supermarkets. Our real cus­tomers are nurseries, mothers filling lunch boxes/party packs, women’s groups and churches. Our products are well pack­aged in travel-friendly colourful pouches and quite unique with child safety baby caps.
Don’t you think your product is too new for the Nigerian market?
It’s funny you said that. We met with one of the leading su­permarkets in Nigeria last year and they said it’s a great product but they were reluctant to stock it as they felt Nigerian parents were not ready for it yet. They are now our biggest clients. With rapid investments in Nigeria and the new wave of supermarkets and malls growing across the country, we hope Tomi’s Treats will continue thriving as the first indigenous organic baby food brand.
What prompted you to explore organic baby food?
After I had my first child and I visited Nigeria on holidays, I could not find any organic food to buy for my baby. So, on re­turning to the UK, I decided to follow this idea up while doing my MBA and I created my own business, Tomi’s Treats.
Can all families afford your infant formula?
Not all families can afford the product now but we are work­ing on ways to reduce our price without compromising our qual­ity. We feel that not many babies and children are eating healthy diets. Getting fruit and vegeta­bles into their diets early in life is the best way to help children understand that health is wealth. Our goal is to make Tomi’s Treats afford­able to all fam­ilies.
W h a t are your b i g g e s t challeng­es in the b u s i n e s s and how have you been able to overcome them?
The main challenge has been raising aware­ness because a lot of fam­ilies still don’t know what our product is and the health benefits of organic baby food. From the feedback that we are getting, a lot of children love the product and we are steadily in­creasing our customer base. The biggest challenge since last year is realizing there is no better person to sell my product than I. When people hear the story of how I started the business? They are intrigued especially as my work experience is from a totally different industry. I spend a lot of time managing the busi­ness as well as being a wife and mother to 3 kids and consulting in the oil and gas sector. I think over the last year, we have got the business on a good footing and we are now focusing on our marketing strategy as well as building a super team to take it to the next level. I’m also con­tending with logistics i.e getting our products to different mar­kets and we are already in Abu­ja, Enugu and of course Lagos. We look forward to selling in all t h e capital cities in Ni­geria.
What are your goals for Tomi’s Treats over the next 5 years?
We have just launched our website featuring a special ba­by’s section for new and expect­ing mothers. We envisage that 2015 will be a good year and are planning to introduce new flavors to our range. We’re also developing our customer base and generating more awareness about our products. We are fo­cused on growth and entering into more African countries over the next 5 years.
How did you source your start-up capital?
Luckily enough, the product a n d idea sold itself and we were able to get some private investors passionate about health to back our concept.
How do you source your raw materials?
My raw materials are all organ­ically produced in the EU. Work­ing with my suppliers has been a real learning experience about the organic baby food market. I have been able to leverage their years of experience in this area to get a quality product into the African market. From sourcing the fruits, agreeing on pricing to ship­ping the product have really shown me the complexities of the business. Our goal is to source and pro­duce our formula in Africa. Cur­rently we are speaking to a num­ber of suppliers/producers who we believe will be able to sustain the quality we are looking for. The responses we have received on the product over the last year have been really positive.
How do you relax af­ter a hard day’s work?
My kids are very energetic, so after a day’s work in the office, my work is not over until their bedtime. I love to read.
From childhood I’ve al­ways loved reading as it relaxes and helps me un­wind. My husband is a sports fanatic and movie buff so if we are not entertaining guests, my husband and I spend our evenings curled up on the sofa as I read and as he watch­es a football or rugby match on TV. I love my work and I love to work, but when I’m not at work, I’m with my family . I also love to cook and exercise. I love to run. I participated in a marathon in the UK for charity. I also raised 2,000 pounds for charity five years ago.