An Ancient Grain, a Modern Market, and the Farmers at the Center

At a block party in Brooklyn, Philip Teverow spotted a man roasting a whole lamb in the middle of the street. “I saw this guy outside on the street cooking an entire animal,” Philip remembers, “and I thought, I have to talk with this person.” The cook was Pierre Thiam, James Beard award winning Senegalese chef.

The two only traded a few words that day, but years later, they met again through New York’s food world. Philip had read Pierre’s Food Arts interview about bringing fonio, a West African grain, to a wider market through his restaurant and cooking. Philip had spent 13 years at Dean & DeLuca bringing unfamiliar ingredients to American shoppers, including quinoa in the 1980s.

They seemed like a perfect pairing to bring this lesser known grain to the U.S. market. Philip hoped Pierre might hire him, but they became business partners instead and named their company Yolélé(opens in a new tab), a Fulani word that roughly means “let the good times roll.”

Learning From Quinoa

Yolélé’s first commercial customer was Whole Foods in Harlem. In-store demos showcased its versatility: an ancient grain, naturally gluten-free, and quick to cook. Fonio had all the makings of the next big grain, but Philip and Pierre wanted Yolélé's success to go back to the people who grew it.

If we could commercialize that and create a market for it outside of those communities, it could support livelihoods from this very sustainable agricultural system.

Retail was only the beginning. Yolélé quickly grew as a consumer product but also supplied beer breweries across the world with fonio for brewing. The impact story is what got brewers interested, but they keep using the grain because of the tropical juiciness it imparts. And when large food and beverage manufacturers are using ingredients at scale, this is where impact can really happen.

Off Their Plate

Running a company that stretches from grocery stores across America, to small farms in Senegal and Mali and Europe, North America and Asia, is complicated enough. But during COVID, the Yolélé team dispersed geographically. Their previous payroll provider just couldn’t keep up, and they found themselves dealing with complicated compliance issues all at once.

For a small team trying to bring a West African staple to the U.S, every hour spent sorting out compliance and tax filings was an hour taken from farmers, customers, and their mission. Looking for a better option, the founders came across Justworks. It turned out to be exactly what they needed.

The thing that really helped us was unraveling that tangle of jurisdictions caused by our geographic dispersal during COVID. Justworks really helped us figure that out.

Today, Yolélé relies on Justworks, which allows their team to work wherever while staying confident payroll and compliance are totally handled. “It’s great to have Justworks to do that work for us,” says Philip. What the founders value most is getting a quick answer from a real person. For a team juggling grant-funded projects in West Africa, brewery partnerships, and retail, quick support matters.

Any time I have a problem, I reach out, and boom, I get responses. I can pick up the phone and speak with a human being.

With burdensome admin and payroll seamlessly handled, Philip and Pierre can focus on what they started Yolélé to do: build a market where the farmers win too.

Planting What Comes Next

For Philip and Pierre, the message is simple: West African food belongs on every table. Its culinary traditions are some of the most diverse in the world, rich in flavor, nourishing, and often grown in ways that are good for the land. Yet outside the region, these foods are still hard to find. Fonio is only the beginning.

As they grow, Yolélé is building markets for the crops that grow alongside it, including millet and sorghum, so farmers aren’t dependent on a single harvest to help keep traditional, biodiverse farming systems alive. A recent grant is funding two pilot aggregation centers in Senegal and Mali, which will help to train and equip local farmers.

The goal is to become the industry’s first stop for better ingredients, with the farmers who grow them benefiting at every step. Yolélé isn’t trying to create the next quinoa. It’s showing that an ancient grain can build a market that grows with its farmers.