Did you miss David’s talk at Marketing South this past week? Never worry, we’ve boiled it down to a wee blog post for you. This is the Crafty Weka Story. Enjoy!
We still have plenty to achieve and improve. But let me tell you a little about our journey.
About Me.
I’ve been married for 34 years to his partner Clare, the co-founder of the TCWB and my partner in crime. Though I think some days she could give me away! We are each other’s Ying and Yang, so we make a good team.
We have three children, Emily Rose, Sophie and Nicholas who are all supporting themselves through their own careers. My oldest daughter says my relentless positivity can be annoying! I’m not your everyday Joe! I’m an active relaxer, I struggle to sit through a movie. I have never read a book but read articles and listen to podcasts and I talk a lot.
The Bakery.
I’m from the school of David and like to call my degree DDLE: David Dunn Life Experience. It seems I am unemployable! I have had two jobs, one for 8 months and was sacked, then got another job at a bakery (I said I was a baker which I wasn’t) and spent 6 months cleaning trays watching the bakers. I then purchased my first bakery at the age of 20 – I had to learn to bake really quickly! After 3 weeks of owning the barkery I got appendicitis.. I drove myself to the hospital and was back at work 3 days later.
We owned the bakery from 1981 to 2019 which translates to 37 years of getting up at 2am 5/6 days a week. Things were tough after the ChCh earthquakes 2011 and our business went to ground zero. We built it up again to have a sellable business, then we noticed gap in the market…Healthy snack bars! We decided to create a product made with natural foods in compostable packaging
Our recipe uses only ingredients a child could read, and the ‘window’ element to our bar packaging shows transparency. See what you eat, taste what you see.Â
Dreaming Big.
We soon realised we wanted CW to have the ability to sell nationally and internationally. A local product with international impact. Yep, we dreamt big. Go big or go home.
In July 2017, we started making TCWB on a larger scale. We packaged up 5000 products and took it to market – the response was pretty cool. The market told us these are bloody good for bird seed. So we bootlegged TCWB within the Cookery Nook, our bakery.
At this point I had to learn a complete new skill set: Computer, copy and paste, Dropboxes, Google docs, spreadsheets. Welcome David to growing a national and international business. Local product, global impact, bloody hell it’s a big call. But think big and who knows! Have the courage and achieve your goals. Just get on with it, is my attitude. It was a natural transition.Â
Business Set Up.
I always say, don’t think too much about the problems, just get on with it and fix the problems later. There is always a solution in the room. Procrastination holds you up, so be reactive with your innovative thoughts.
The next stage was business set up. We incorporated TCWB on 1st Feb 2018 and leased another premises in April 2019 in Ferrymead. Soon after on 19 July 2019, we sold the bakery. We slowly started developing new flavours, the first of which was Date & Orange after 6 months of being in business, based on our bestselling date and orange scone at the bakery.
Then, we had the first Covid lockdown on 25 March 2020. We set ourselves up on Shopify for Australia/ New Zealand and also set up a company in the US – including all the bells and whistles that goes with that. Sales rep, warehousing in Port Oregon then moved it to New York, Trademarking etc.
Myself and Clare are both very active in our roles. Me: Sales, the mouthpiece. Clare: Administration, NPD, transactional management. We have a full understanding of operational, workflow procedures and food control programs. We are also proud of the CW team that work with us and help us to produce a unique premium product.
We have managed to pivot our whole work and private lives, bringing a new passion, drive and energy, with plenty of CWB adventures. You know, I don’t feel like I work a day in my life.
Strong Partnerships
Another thing that has blown me away is the number of passionate, helpful, excited people that engaged themselves in the CW brand’s personality. Professional services, NZTE, lawyers, strategists. Our crafty team that we engage with – directly and indirectly – are smart people and this means they have the ability to help us do our job. Every business has weakness and this can be strengthened by outsourcing work to those that are experts in the field to give strength.
Do not try to be an expert at everything! You will be overwhelmed. Help is just a phone call away and remember there is such thing as a dumb question. You run your business, do not have your business run you.
I wanted to grow an impressive successful business that stood out from others. We didn’t want to follow, we are going to lead in what we were creating because we have the drive to change the way in real snack foods. Success is a choice and a commitment it doesn’t happen accidentally
Where We Are Now
To date, TCWB has set up companies in NZ, AU, USA, it’s a trademarked brand, and we have warehousing in Sydney and New York. This is because we go direct-to-market missing the middle man holding on to margin. We are just about to sign a distribution agreement for Indonesia, Thailand and Taiwan. This all sounds impressive, but to tell you the truth, the only markets that are really working for us at the moment are NZ and AU. So still plenty of scope to improve and grow!
Some of the main things that have helped us on our journey are…
- A strong positive working culture (some of the things we do are daily team lunches cooked for everyone, birthday presents and cake, flexible start times)
- A small marketing budget with a focus on Social Media
- Directly connecting with customers on Roadies
- Strong partnerships and a strong owner/team connection
- Quick decisions, no procrastination
- Don’t be scared to make mistakes!
This is the Crafty Weka StoryÂ
A CHCH-based Snackification BusinessÂ
Thanks for reading!
