The Australian Superfood Co on Australian Collective

What made you take the plunge?

I always knew I didn’t want to follow the traditional dietitian’s path. Seeing the growing interest in foreign superfoods ignited my curiosity about Australian superfoods, so I started researching what our land has to offer. I travelled to the Northern Territory, visiting some remote communities. In each community, elders complained about reoccurring health issues stemming from a diet lacking in fresh foods. Instead of relying on their traditional diet, which featured fresh bush tucker, they now consumed mainly cheap, processed fast foods.

I tried bush tucker for the first time while I was there and loved the unique flavours. I knew that I wanted to share these foods and flavours with Australia and the world. Upon returning to Melbourne I started to explore the nutritional content and current farming practices of Australian bush tucker. I was thrilled to discover that Australian bush tucker has superfood nutritional status and realised that Indigenous communities could benefit from collecting and cultivating bush tucker.

What are your greatest lessons learnt so far?

1.    Make time for loved ones, no day is ever too busy for a laugh and a cuddle.

2.    Never make a decision based only on financial gain. Passion is what gets you out of bed in the morning, without it everything is a whole lot harder and less enjoyable.

3.    Always find time to exercise. On the days when you have no time, you need it the most.

What is the definition of success for you?

Feeling I’ve worked hard at the end of each day, being pleased with how I’ve spent my time, and being able to sleep peacefully.

Feeling that my work is making a meaningful contribution to society.

Feeling like I’ve made every family member and friend I’ve come in contact with know somehow that I love them and am grateful for them.

Seeing my children grow up to be happy, successful, and responsible young adults.

What motivates you?

People motivate me, be it family and friends or the dedicated Australian Superfood team. We always seem to be cheering each other on and lending a helping hand.

I love training and building a strong team of people who share a common vision, establishing goals we can all reach together and watching the results. Having an idea for a product and seeing it come to fruition after all of the development, testing, branding, etc. is complete, is another motivating factor.
Where do you get your inspiration from?

Eating out in Melbourne’s amazing restaurants and cafes like Combi and Matcha Mylkbar is always a great source of recipe inspiration for what we can do with some of our freeze dried superfood powders, and soon, granolas! Of course, Instagram is another great source of inspiration as is travelling abroad (and in Australia – Byron is always a hot spot for me!). Attending industry expos and events is a great way to network with some truly inspiring people in the health and wellness space.

What are your favourite Instagram accounts?

@melissafindley and @helloemilie for their beautiful shots of the Australian landscape.@talinegabriel and @elsas_wholesomelife for their amazing, nutritious food creations and@designlovefest for a serious dose of colourful, visual inspiration.

What are your best business Apps?

We love Canva for creating easy, beautiful graphics for social media. And it’s so simple everyone can use it. Schedugram is super handy for scheduling in all of our Instagram content weeks in advance and helping us stay on top of any upcoming holidays, events, news, that’s might be interesting to our followers. Mail Chimp for sending out our monthly newsletter and Xero for our accounting.

Running your own company can be very stressful. How do you recharge?

Always with a big glass of wine in hand … Just kidding! I try and escape the city with my family as often as we can. So driving down to the peninsula or Torquay for the weekend and recharging on the beach. But in the day to day, I like to go swimming, running or yoga to clear my mind and energise myself. Also, a vacation to look forward to at least once a year is a must!

What are the core values of your business?

Australian Superfoods – we are one of the few commercial brands harnessing and promoting Australia’s native superfoods. Many studies have indicated that these superfoods have exceptional nutritional qualities, which far exceed many of the commonly known (imported) superfoods.

Respect for the land and history of Australia’s aborigines.

Creating products that are nutritionally dense with no artificial flavours, colours or preservatives. Being naturally gluten free, dairy free and with no cane sugar is an added bonus!

Working with the community – TASC is working closely with an Aboriginal community in the Northern Territory to increase employment opportunities for indigenous Australians as well as providing funding to improve living conditions for aboriginal youth. In fact, last season we created over 300 jobs harvesting fruits in a community that has a 4% employment rate.

 You can read the original article here.

News, Media