The latest rumour in the hospitality industry that Maquis Tante Marie, has acquired the defunct DC10 and operating under the name La Tante DC10 is absolutely wrong.

Through this article, we the owners and directors of Maquis Tante Marie, seek to tell our patrons and stakeholders that we have no affiliation with it, no association or any links whatsoever with the aeroplane restaurant.

Recently the management of Maquis Tante Marie has been bombarded with a lot of queries, “why would you want to expand into a defunct aeroplane?” “I do not think your move to open up a restaurant in an aeroplane was a good one!” These are some of the milder comments I can include in this write up- but for the most part, the concerns have been genuine but masked with sarcasm and disapproval.

COPY-CATTING

While Maquis Tante Marie has nothing against their aeroplane restaurant, what we take issue with, is that when their customers ask if La Tante DC 10 is Maquis Tante Marie, they say ‘yes’ which has led to this misinformation. Again since we, Maquis Tante Marie, pioneered the African dish concept in the year 2000, why would any restaurant entrepreneur, sure about their vision and pedigree want to piggy back off our name whose brand flies high in the city? Of course the Registrar General would not have a problem with registering the name, ‘La Tante…’ since it was not word for word with Maquis Tante Marie but they the owners, could not they have been their ‘own man’ by choosing a different name? Couldn’t they have said to themselves ‘they are out there getting on with their brand’ and ‘we are where we are?’

From where I sit, I find out that in Ghana small and medium scale entrepreneurs lack the vision and creativity thatset them apart as distinct and individual business concerns with a strong personal identity. Suffice it to think that when you hear about something, you are late; but does it mean that you should do the exact same thing? Again if you find out that tomatoes and pepper sell well on a particular street, does it mean that we should all go sell on that street? Take the example of the Micro-Finance companies, most of them have taken their names and their taglines from the most successful Micro-finance company now turned bank.

INNOVATION

Coming back to the theme of originality, the Maquis Tante Marie concept was offered to the city of Accra in April 2000 in response to a growing need to enjoy Ghanaian and African cuisine in a clean and genial environment. With the opening up of the Ghanaian economy and the rise of the middle class, expatriates working with multi nationals, the executive corps mindful of eating right; and Ghanaians returning home on holiday all longed to dine at world-class restaurants but this time to savour local meals which would leave lingering tropical tastes. Maquis Tante Marie was ready for this transition and since then we haven’t looked back. Like any other human organisation, we have learnt from our mistakes and rode on the back of our achievements. In addition to the upscale location where the mother branch is hosted in Labone, we have operated from the Accra Mall from 2008 and from March 2013, at the Marina Mall. Why would we want to spread ourselves thin by pitching tent right opposite the Marina Mall? And more so, in an aeroplane whose mother company still brings memories of delay and disappointment? Besides we do not have an aviation theme nor does our reality of creativity come near an aircraft-turned-restaurant.

IDENTITY

At Tante Marie our trademarks are at once spotted by our thatched roofs, bamboo panels, wooded-crescent shaped bars, and unique place names which gives our visitors an African welcome. The menu itself reflects our tagline “West Africa on your plate.” Our patrons will speak of Senegalese Tchebou Djen and pintade braise- grilled guinea fowl from Burkina Faso; the proverbial fufu and aponkye krakra made with a touch of grandma’s secrets, Ivorian-styled grilled chicken drizzled with veges served with attieke are part of the tasty dishes we have served and deliveredover 13 years and has planted us on the restaurant scape. If we can talk about taste “sans frontiers” – taste without borders,we also offer a menu of continental dishes which always turns out as a pleasant confirmation for our guests who expect a restaurant of our calibre to satisfy the caprices of their taste buds.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

Reverting to my fellow small and medium scale colleagues let me leave you with these nuggets of advice which I got from my treasure trove of proverbs: “do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not” and two, “if your ship has not come in, swim out to it!!”