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When Boyede Sobitan worked as a healthcare consultant, traveling four or five days out of every week, his return home to Chicago was often met with a request from his Nigerian mother: Would he accompany her to the African grocery store?
Sobitan’s family had long frequented La Fruteria, a store on Chicago’s South Side specializing in African and Caribbean products such as Ghanaian yams and custom cuts of goat meat. Hoping to save himself the trip after a long week on the road, Sobitan tried to order online. But it wasn’t an option.
Sobitan discovered that friends faced similar frustrations: they could get their regular groceries delivered through services like Peapod or Instacart, but they had to travel in person, often long distances, to pick up culturally specific…