We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Fatim Dasse. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Fatim below.

Fatim , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about a time you helped a customer really get an amazing result through their work with you.

Foodian’s Place offers some catering options for small to large events. One day, we were contacted by a customer who was interested by another type of service. He is a single dad who is very busy with work and although he likes to cook, he just did not have the time to do so. He had tasted our food before and wanted us to help him. Aside from proposing our already made seasonings and marinades, we designed a special offer for him and have been offering him meal preps that last him for weeks so he does not have to worry about what to cook and eat after work.

This, is an example of what Foodian’s Place is about: offloading you and simplifying your life !

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My name is Fatim T. DASSE and I am an African immigrant who resides in the US since 2011. I came here for my education after obtaining my high school diploma. It was never a dream to start Foodian’s Place, to be honest. It started as a revolution against injustice. I had just moved to Minnesota in 2015 (from New Jersey) and I was going to school in Mankato, a small town full of international students.
If there is one thing that all international students can agree on is that we often miss our country and one thing that usually helps soothe that pain is having good meals from there. But unfortunately, I realized that even that was a struggle.
We only had one African store in Mankato and knowing that, the owner was overpricing the few ingredients we could get. I found it so unfair that I decided to do something about it. I talked about that to my boyfriend at the time (husband now) and that same night we went and got a freezer from Best Buy and we decided that we will start making the drive to the twin cities and sell ingredients at a more affordable price. That’s how “Fatim African Supply” started !

The following year, my boyfriend and I graduated and moved to the twin cities. It was a new challenge ! Here, people had access to affordable ingredients. What they were lacking was time. My motto is “if there is a problem, then there is a solution; if there is no solution, then there is no problem”. So I decided to be the solution by offering my all-ready seasonings, beverages and my catering services. This is how we became Foodian’s Place !

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

A lesson I had to unlearn is counting on immediate entourage to be our primary target. When we open a business, we usually believe that our family members and friends will be our biggest supporters. It can be true or not. And when it is not, that can be pretty brutal ! I am fortunate to have around me great people who do not hesitate to support my business in any way they can. But truth be told, they are not my main customers.

Understanding that has helped me go out of my comfort zone, look for strategies to reach out to more people. It has also help me on a personal level as it forced me to “put myself out there”.

We’d love to hear about how you met your business partner.

My business partner is my husband. I met him in 2015 at Mankato State University. He is honestly the perfect business partner I could ever dream of. He is very passionate, ambitious and talented. He always sees what I do not, think about what I do not. Since the beginning, he has been with me and our business. For years, we have made it work and I am very grateful for that ! When we reach where we envision to go, it will be thanks to God and to him, who has always been my number fan and supporter.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.foodiansplace.com
• Instagram: Foodians_Place
• Facebook: Foodian’s Place

Image Credits

RJ Photography 225