ABOUT ME & MY MISSION

I am Francis, a Nigerian who lives in Germany - I founded enyi 2 years ago. enyi is located in Germany and Nigeria with its mission to offer and promote products made in West Africa to bring value in form of fair wages to local producers and processors. From our perspective, the African continent is the most resource-abundant continent. Almost every country in Africa has a high deposit of natural resources.

But processing and production takes place mostly on other continents like Asia. In other words, value addition happens somewhere else while most raw products are exported at very low price levels. And on the other hand, the African continent has been in vogue for a couple of years. Big fashion brands, well-known car brands, banks, insurance companies - all advertise with Black models.

A world-renowned Swedish furniture store recently launched an African collection. This is supposed to strike a chord with customers - but leaves out the local people. Moreover, there is still an image in people's minds that the African continent can be saved with charity campaigns. This is where my brand enyi comes into play. With enyi, I want to sell products "Made in West Africa" and let the local producers and processors participate.

I invest and develop products together, which are then sold under my brand. It is important to me that the products are produced and processed in West Africa and that I can make a contribution at the local community level.

DECOLONIZD

On my way to found a business I just realized that there is still long way to go to decolonize our worldwide mindsets.
The colonial way, still ongoing, affects communities deeply. Across the globe, Indigenous communities are fighting to regain access to their land or fighting to protect land that is constantly threatened by forces looking to profit off of natural resources. Its time to rethink and reflect and start to decolonize. Decolonization is work and a needed process that needs to be done to all of us, everywhere.
We believe that its urgently needed to reflect about our behaviour, habits and also consumption patterns. Whom or what business ideas do we support with what we consume.
I want to start to rethink and learn- we investigate in research on our Instagram (decolonizd) and with our blog to contribute on the mission in decolonizing products we use.

ABOUT THE NAME enyi

The term enyi means “my friend” in Igbo language, originated from West Africa, Nigeria. The name stands for supporting each other and for openness towards each individual way of living and towards a diverse world. Priorotising Made in Africa products is the road to economic success. The slang “bold & free” stands for to be what you want to be, in a way to express your personality in wearing trendless, special and outstanding fashion collections which includes streetstyle fashion, accessories and use ethically sourced body care products which contribute to the social welfare of the origin countries from where most of the components and materials come from.