After 25 years building Tasty African Food from a single restaurant in Woolwich to a network of 27 outlets across London and Kent, founders Michael and Abi Olaleye are now setting their sights on a much bigger prize: 100 sites nationwide within the next five years.
The couple, who began serving West African dishes to their church community before opening their first site, have grown the business without taking outside investment, preferring slower, controlled expansion to preserve quality and brand integrity.
“When we started, it was crazy, looking back,” said Michael, who was working in IT while Abi was a teacher. “We went from certainty to uncertainty, but the response to Abi’s cooking was incredible.” Early on, their decision not to sell alcohol, in line with their faith, limited margins. “Most restaurants make profit from alcohol,” he explained. “We resolved that — we don’t consume alcohol ourselves, but there’s nothing wrong with selling it. Once we started, sales increased and people began taking us seriously.”
Four years later, they began expanding, inspired by the likes of McDonald’s. Today, of their 30 restaurants, 12 operate as franchises. The company plans to use the franchise model to grow beyond what Michael describes as a “saturated” London market into Birmingham, other Midlands cities and Scotland.
Alongside its restaurants, Tasty African Food produces ready meals from a Thamesmead factory, supplying Sainsbury’s and its own online store, caters for weddings and parties, and operates its own ordering app alongside listings on Deliveroo and Uber Eats. Revenues have reached £7 million, supported by a workforce of around 250 people.
The company’s signature dish, jollof rice with chicken, remains its bestseller. “It’s very tasty, very spicy, and it’s simple when you look at the ingredients,” said Michael. “But you can have the same ingredients and produce many varieties. We have a special way of cooking ours and it’s always been excellent.” While West African cuisine is not yet as embedded in British food culture as Chinese or Indian dishes, the customer base is broad. “We are setting the trend,” he said. “In Sainsbury’s, it’s people of all ethnicities picking our meals off the shelves.”
The Olayeyes’ commitment to full ownership reflects a cautious approach to growth. “There’s a danger in expanding without control and losing quality,” Michael said. “We want to grow organically, not just go for the boom.” Quality and affordability are cornerstones: “What you cannot eat, you should not sell,” he added. In response to tighter consumer budgets, the company has recently cut the price of jollof rice and chicken from £7 to £5, a move made possible by economies of scale.
Still, the business faces the same pressures as the wider hospitality sector, from higher wages and national insurance costs to rising food and energy prices. To mitigate these, Tasty African Food is sourcing more ingredients directly from producers and automating parts of its production process, including pie filling, ready meal sealing and quality control.
Although two of their sons now work in the business, Michael stresses that the “family” ethos extends to staff and franchisees — three current franchise owners are former employees, and he hopes more will follow. “We have a young, dynamic, passionate team that more or less become family members,” he said. “We’re mentoring them for the next phase of the business.”
The couple still take food to church every Sunday, a tradition they have no intention of abandoning. “That was the starting point of this business,” Michael said, smiling. “It would be very ungrateful for us to stop now that we are bigger.”
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Tasty African Food plans nationwide expansion to 100 UK restaurants in five years
