Startup Story
Yolanda Matine is the founder of MomlifeMarmitas in Mozambique, a business idea inspired by her two daughters. Yolanda has taken various entrepreneurial routes in the past 10 years, but has now arrived at her destination, doing what she loves the most, which is cooking. She is using this love to help caretakers (moms, dads, grannies, aunties, uncles, helpers) to make healthy lunchboxes (with less processed food) for their children, while at the same time creating incredible food memories. MomlifeMarmitas offers courses with weekly menus, recipes, weekly shopping lists, lunchbox set ups, bento boxes, accessories, and an eBook with more than 25 recipes, tips on food storage, and lunchbox plans.
LoA spoke to Yolanda about her new business venture, the importance of following your passion in business, and her ambitions for the future.
What does your company do?
We offer courses to help you prepare a healthy lunchbox with weekly menu and shopping list, exclusive recipes, and tips. Bento boxes, Lunchbox accessories, and eBooks.
“We offer courses to help you prepare a healthy lunchbox with weekly menu and shopping list, exclusive recipes, and tips. Bento boxes, Lunchbox accessories, and eBooks.”
What inspired you to start your company?
My 2 daughters, and the fact that I wanted them to start eating healthier (less processed food) and I wanted to contribute to their food memories by making fun food to eat. Another part of the inspiration is the fact that I still remember this one time my mom made a fried egg sandwich and putted together with bananas and I still remember the taste and the smell of that lunch box, and I wanted to replicate this same feeling for my daughters when they are old, or when I am no longer here.
What makes your business, service or product special?
It’s the first in the Mozambican Market. It focuses on children, which are the next generation and if we teach them good habits, they will carry them on. We create a community of conscious parents, which use food to educate and have fun.
“My business focuses on children which are the next generation, and if we teach them good habits, they will carry them on.”
Tell us a little about your team
I am the team, I am passionate about food and love cooking, the way I love the people around me.
Share a little about your entrepreneurial journey, and do you come from an entrepreneurial background?
I am not from a formal entrepreneurial background, but I grew up seeing my grandmother and aunties always trying to sell something, and since then I realized that I could use what has been given to me freely to make other people's lives easier, I decided to jump into the entrepreneurial journey. In the past year I have done a lot up to now where I enjoy cooking and creating fun lunchboxes for my daughters, seeing them eating foods they would normally reject if cooked the ordinary way is the biggest win.
What are your future plans and aspirations for the company?
For the near future I would like to open a physical shop, where I can share the products and words like bento boxes, accessories, and have my own bento box design line.
“For the near future I would like to open a physical shop, where I can share the products and words like bento boxes, accessories, and have my own bento box design line.”
What gives you the most satisfaction being an entrepreneur?
Helping others, realize their strengths and how by taking little actions they can impact a whole generation.
What’s the biggest piece of advice you can give to other women looking to start-up?
Just Start, nothing and no one is perfect and through the imperfections other opportunities will arise.
Contact or follow MomlifeMarmitas
INSTAGRAM | EMAIL momlifemarmitas@gmail.com
Why LoA loves it…
Successful businesses are built by finding gaps in the market and customer needs that are looking for solutions. In the case of Yolanda Matine, she saw a gap in the market and a real need to help parents like herself to help her children to eat healthy lunchboxes at school. Her new business, Momlifemarmitas, is creating an engaging way of making healthy and fun children’s lunchboxes that young ones really do want to eat. This is a business making a positive contribution to children’s lives by making healthy eating fun for all the family. — Melanie Hawken, founder & ceo, Lionesses of Africa