Donna Carrier is the proprietor of Bent on Food Cafe and Regional Produce Store, Bent on Food Cookery School and Bent on Life.
She started Bent on Food 7 years ago and the business has grown from strength to strength. Donna grew up in the region on acres where she enjoyed gardening and looking after the animals. She has always enjoyed food and cooking and spent 18 years in the wine industry where she completed her Associate diploma in Wine Marketing at Roseworthy Agricultural College. She is proud to have worked for wonderful family owned companies such as Brown Brothers Wines, Yalumba Wines and Cassegrain Wines, she also worked with many small producers in the wine industry and her passion for food and wine is evident.
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Christo: Welcome back to the Basic Bananas podcast. Today, we have a very special guest. This is a really fun interview which I did with Donna Carrier. I’m sure there’s some gold nuggets in this one for everybody, have it listed as a good fun interview. Just before I bring Donna on to the call, a little bit of background about Donna. Donna grew up in the Manning Valley and lived in a property with a huge vegetable garden and a home surrounded by fruit trees. Her mother was a wonderful cook with a green thumb and taught her the importance of fresh produce. Donna studied agriculture in high school and as a teenager she loves gardening and tending to the animals. Donna also enjoyed cooking although she never liked to eat her own animals…. That’s a good thing. After working for 20 years in the hospitality/wine industry, Donna went to Sydney and got her Associate Deployment in One Marketing from the renowned Roseworthy Agricultural College. Her heart was always in the Manning Valley, so in 2002. She returned home, Donna’s done some amazing things with her business over the last 8 years, so let’s bring her onto the call. So welcome, Donna.
Donna: Yeah, thank you. Happy to be in the show.
Christo: Thank you very much for joining me and you’re actually on holiday at the moment?
Donna: Yeah, yeah. We’re taking a little mini break which is lovely, the weather is beautiful. Doing a bit of swimming and getting a bit of sun, not eating much, though, we’re on a special diet. Going away and being on a diet is not really that much fun. Yeah, I had to break that diet and have a glass of wine last night, though.
Christo: Oh, good. A holiday deserves a glass of wine, doesn’t it? It would be the same.
Donna: I think.
Christo: Excellent. So, from you, let’s hear a little bit. Could you tell us a little bit more about you and your business journey so far?
Donna: My background was in the wine industry for about 18 years and I really love that industry- it’s really collaborative, I met some great people and I had a few really good jobs and working in marketing and public relations. So, I hadn’t really travelled much; when I was around 36 years old I decided to just throw everything in and go off travelling for about a year and a half and while I was away, it was fun, it was really great. And, it’s a little bit; it was nice when I was a little bit older because I appreciated things a lot more than when I was younger and I… And I still wanted to be in the wine industry but I wanted to move out of Sydney and up to the mid-north coast which is where I come from, near Wingham, where my business is now. And the closest was Port Macquarie, I was lucky to get a job out there for a couple of years and then I felt that I was travelling too far. And then I setup the business that I now have, about 8 and 1/2 years ago, Bent on Food. In a really small little space next to a cookery school. This is really, because, I wanted to concentrate on local produce and bring the region’s produce together in one outlet and develop a cafe; start from there and work closely with the cookery school next door.
Since then, we’ve moved to a larger premises and within the first 3 years, we outgrew that premises. We moved into the main street which is much, it’s a much better position and it’s a lot bigger and we’ve been growing that space ever since, with a big garden out the back, now. And, a couple of years ago, I took the cookery school over- so that’s also part of the business and 3-4 years ago I opened home ware store as well, so, there’s a lot more reasons to come to Wingham now.
Christo: Excellent, I love it. So tell us a little bit about Bent on Food- I love the name, by the way.
Donna: Yeah, when we started we were on Bent straight, so that’s how that happened.
Christo: Oh, there you go.
Donna: Yeah, as to what to call the business and luckily I was also in a marketing department and we were sitting around in our lunch breaks trying to come up with the names and then, I was like, “Yeah, we’re on Bent… Bent on food- that’s a really cool name.” So, right away I got on and got on to IP Australia and made sure that it was mine and no one can take it.
Christo: Yeah.
Donna: And I had a friend, my friend who was a graphic designer, he had his own business in Sydney and he did all my marketing, all my designs for free for me. He has been really helpful. So the business is, a cafe- we do music nights, we have a happy business which we send hampers all over Australia. We have our own product range which now has 12 products in it and we grow that every year. We work really closely with a friend of ours at the other chef and we developed the range together. So it’s just grown from a small little shop-cafe to the place that people say, “Let’s go to Wingham to that famous place, to that Bent on Food.” Not meaning to sound egotistical but we do hear that when people come in to the cafe.
Christo: Nice.
Donna: Yeah, it’s fun. It’s a really fun place, people, especially when people are coming out of Sydney and often, they’re expectations of regional restaurants and cafes can be a little bit low, not that they should be, because there’s some beautiful restaurants and cafes in regional New South Wales. But, with the cafe they sometimes expect in a town like Wingham that they’re going to see the lace tablecloths and that, you know.
Christo: Yeah, the right truck stop kind of, red and white checkered tablecloth.
Nice. That’s typical. And what about within business, what are you most passionate about, you obviously have a big background in wine. So let’s think about, let’s think about what you’re passionate about business.
Donna: Well, I still feel pretty passionate about wine, but until now, we haven’t had a wine license, but my application is in at the moment and within a few weeks, we will have a wine license and I’m pretty excited about that. Get back to matching some wine and food and playing around with the menus a bit more, we do the old food and wine dinner and I always make sure that I put a wine on the table when we do a cooking class. But I think my main passion is, I’m really careful and I make sure that my chef and my staff are too, about, sustainability and about environmental issues. I think that if we could get ours food from close to home, something that’s grown in our region then, I’d do that rather than get something that’s come from far away. Not only to save the carbon miles, but also it tastes better. And we have our own garden out the back, now, with olives and herbs that we need. We have worked closely with the grower who we buy our lettuce from, we get our beef locally, and it’s all beef. And, it’s a little bit harder to do it this way, I think. Because some people can just pick up a supplier and say we want this, the other and not have to go around so many suppliers and meet with them and, you know, “Do you mind if we rock if it‘s a little bit smaller if you’d pick it a little bit earlier.” And things like that. But, that’s really my main passion, I think is, that we’re really true to what we put on the plate.
Christo: Yeah. Wow, that’s excellent. And what about in terms of marketing, I know. I love that whole approach, you take and obviously that’s going to assist with your marketing, but in a congruent kind of business, like what you’re saying there about supplies. Because I could imagine you, you could easily find one big supplier that fits all, but the quality might not be there. It might be kind of sending money elsewhere and the quality might not be quite up to scratch, but, obviously, what you produce is part of your marketing and by having that kind of stance in your business. And what else, how else do you market your business or what’s your favorite marketing strategy for yourself?
Donna: I guess, I’m pretty big on the public relations angle, I mean, having done a fair bit of that in my past. And whenever we’re doing something, I always make sure everybody knows about it. Sometimes, they probably get sick of hearing from me but they still broadcast. And, we get involved in a lot of things like raising money for charities and things like that, too. And I always make sure that, that, it’s not, it’s not a marketing… It’s just I guess that people know that we’re doing it, so that they can support us and then we can actually make more funds for charity if we are supported. But, I guess it’s a matter of just being out there all the time. We’ve a pretty strong Facebook page and I like social media websites kept up to date. But, it’s generally being out there and talking to people and the repeat business is really important to us so we make sure that they have a good time when they’re there and that they enjoy their meal; I think that’s probably the biggest thing. But just being supportive, I think also being very supportive of what’s going on in our local area and making sure that we’re behind that. Because, really, we get a lot of tourists because we are, a tourism award-winning business but we also rely on the locals and I care about them, that they’re giving us their money. So we support their community issues as well.
Christo: Excellent, I love it. And, it’s really cool. And you mentioned publicity and payout and I know you’re really good at that. And I love that how you said, just keep telling them whenever you do something, you tell everyone about it. Because, that’s sometimes, I think business owners think, “Oh, well, let’s not really use… They think, Oh, they, I don’t want to look like I’ve got a big head, egotistical. I don’t want to tell the world about it. Obviously, that kind of exposure and people love that stuff. So, it’s something I recommend all our listeners should be taking action on, getting that PR, especially when it’s free, it’s free exposure. And you being a little bit of a pro at this, a bit of an expert. Would you have any insider tips for our listeners on getting media exposure?
Donna: I always make sure that I take photos of things that we are doing. You don’t need to take a brilliant photo, but make sure, with iPhones and smart phones now, you can get a great photo on a smart phone. And send photos to, especially to local publications if you’re in a regional area- it’s easier because they’re always looking for some news. If you can write, if you’re not very good at writing a media release, possibly every now and again, you get someone to write one for you, if you’ve got some news that can go out to the media publications- I do mine myself and, we’ve got some really good press in major publications over the years; in Good Living and Country Style and Delicious magazine, we’ve had inclusions. I’d like to get more, but I always want more. And, I think, you just need to get out there, and sometimes, I feel that sometimes too. Because I’m always sending out information, I often seem to ask occasionally about sending something thinking, they must be getting sick of me. And then I just rise above it and think, “Well, if they don’t want to print it then they won’t print it.” And, the only way they can find about what you’re doing is to let them know.
Christo: Yeah, exactly.
Donna: And don’t get upset if they don’t print it. Because, I think the media, you must realize that they’re not always going to jump on and get back to you straight away and say, “Oh, great. I really love that and I’m going to write about you.” You might see you down the track, that they’ve remembered you and have kept your files somewhere and they’ve called you back and said, if you got anything to contribute to this story, then I’m writing.”
Christo: I love that. I love the fact how you said, that sometimes the media, they’re actually looking for things to write about, too. So, it’s just giving them that, they do need something to put in the papers, so, make it easy for them.
Donna: Yeah, yeah. I think it’s also important maybe, to collaborate with other businesses and join campaigns when they’re happening. Just, it might cost you a little bit of money, but it means that you can get your whole region marketed for a much cheaper price than what you’d be able to do if you did yourself. So, I’m always pretty much in to buying in to campaigns that promote my whole region because that’s helping all of us.
Christo: Yeah, I love it. Nice. And another little gold nugget you dropped in there was just taking photos.
Donna: Yeah.
Christo: That’s just so simple, but just so forgotten or overlooked. Or people are busy, it’s just such a great way to market and promote so people can see, so that’s really gold. Thank you for that.
Donna: Yeah, no worries.
Christo: And you’ve won many awards, business awards. So, what about tips for listeners? Because obviously, winning the awards is a great way to get exposure and credibility, of course.
Donna: Yeah.
Christo: What about, do you have any tips for our listeners on how they can make, kind of their entries. It’s all about the entry, that’s what we kind of seem to think. So, the approach to entering the business awards, do you have any tips for our listeners around that?
Donna: Well, many of the awards that we have won are tourism awards, as well as business awards and catering restaurant and catering awards. They’re all a little bit different, the restaurant and catering awards doesn’t require a large submission, but the rest of them do. Not everyone, once again, not everybody’s able to write a really good submission and a lot of people will pay somebody to do that. If you’ve got a really good business and you think that you can win an award, then it might pay, and you can articulate yourself, it might pay to get someone to help you out with it, but, if you think you can put something together, the main thing is to obviously, answer all questions. But, every year it gets easier because you’ve got a little bit of a start. And I find what I do is use it as a business plan or a marketing plan, so we all really should have a business and marketing plan. Personally, I have not, for many years sat down and written a proper business plan. I use the awards processors that, because it allows me to look at everything over the business- how well I’ve gone with staff training, how well I’ve been with sustainability… What, how much profit I’ve made. And where I’m sitting with my revenues as compared to last year. I mean, those sort of things are what I look at anyway, obviously, but it just allows you to have a really good look at your business and start writing things down during the year because you might do a whole lot of great things during the year, support certain things or get involved with things and then forget about it when you go and write your submission. Because, you usually, if you’re like me, you’ve got to wait to write all these submissions and really, you should’ve spent 4 weeks writing them. So, you need to have a bit of a list of things that you’ve done and then you can say, “Oh, yes, that’s right! We’re going to this or that area.” Once you start winning the awards, obviously, it’s a little bit easier to keep winning them because you can then show on your awards submission that you’ve done alright.
And, if you promote those awards really well within your store or in your business as well on your Facebook page or your social media or your website- you’re also more inclined to get further the following year because the awards people love that, they want more people to enter the awards every year, more people to attend their awards night, so they want you to be promoting their awards as well.
Christo: Yeah, excellent. And obviously, I was going to say that as well. When you do win them, you have some tips on sharing, sharing to the world, so obviously you get that there, as well.
Donna: Yeah, that’s right. I mean, when we won, the biggest win for us was the Australian tourism award that we won in 2010, that was a national award in the restaurant and catering category. And we got so much press from that, just naturally, because that came from them. And for the next 2 years, I had a little radio, 10-minute radio segment, every few weeks. With a few with Robbie Bach on ABC Radio and that gave me heaps of exposure, people were getting on my Facebook side and my website and emailing me and asking me for the recipes, so that was excellent until Robbie went to another station.
Christo: Damn it! Oh, bugger! Well, that’s great, that’s awesome results and great tips as well for our listeners, of course. What would you do different, if you could start all over again, what would you do different?
Donna: Definitely, I would think bigger. I think what happened to… My biggest issues over the years have been starting a small business and thinking that it was just going to be a small business.
Christo: Yeah.
Donna: I think, I mean I always hoped it would grow but I didn’t have processors and procedures in place in the beginning and it’s much harder to do that when you’ve already got the business started. It takes a lot longer to get all of that happening and I, I started off with very little in the way of procedures and had to deal with those and if I had just saw it big from the beginning then I probably would have had less trouble with that.
Christo: Nice, I love it. That’s really great, really good tip. Because, when you’ve experienced that a lot with your clients, kind of growing pains or…
Donna: Yeah.
Christo: And changing over this entire system and things…
Donna: Yeah. That’s right.
Christo: Yeah…
Donna: There’s time and money too. The time that cost you as well as having to train staff that already get set in the way that you’ve been doing things, that’s always and it can be difficult.
Christo: Yeah. But then, what would be the biggest lesson you’ve learned in business if you had to kind of, pinpoint, putting it on the spot.
Donna: I’ve learned that over the years, you really need to put your health and your family and your partner and everyone before your business. Because, if you can’t actually run your business because you’re not healthy or happy then it’s going to file anyway. So, I guess that’s a major tip and also, I think, don’t be scared to rise above as well because there are a hell of a lot of green-eyed monsters out there that want to bring you down- I’m not saying that it happens on a regular basis, but as I’ve said, let everybody know what you’re doing. You have to be really confident and believe in yourself and not worry about what everybody else says. Because, often, people have wanted to do things themselves and they haven’t been able to… So they feel the need to bring you down a little bit, I’m not saying, there’s a tiny percentage of people obviously, but just stay strong and confident, I think.
Christo: Yeah. What do you think it is for people to stay strong and confident within their business, like, how do they do that? What’s the… Like something that’s coming to mind, from what I’m hearing with you, is obviously, your business stands for what it is, like how you’re saying you get the local produce and you do the way you want to do it. Is that the kind of thing that allows you to stay confident and strong? By just being congruent all the way through like that, what do you think?
Donna: I think so, I think if you’re true to your word and you do what you believe in and to me that’s really an ethical way to do business, and many others. But what I really enjoy is, there are having, set by set, like I said before, there are also many other businesses that like what I do and want to do that too. And that’s actually lovely because it means that they’re also supporting local produce and they’re also doing the things that are helping sustain the region or, all things greater. And, so that’s great. And also as a business, you have to always be one step ahead and just stay strong and be coming up with ideas all the time. And I think I’m always so busy coming up with ideas and thinking about things that I’ve moved on a little bit from the thing that I was doing before, always dealt with the same core. Always sustainability and local produce, that’s always going to be the core. As long as I stick to that, then I can do so much in business.
Christo: Awesome, I love it. And what’s the future plan? So, where to, next?
Donna: Well, really to get the cookery school up and running, it’s only been going a little while now and we’ve got some great chefs coming to that. We have visiting chefs like Stefano and Freddie and having each one coming up this year… And so to get more people coming to the cookery school, I guess. And I have started tours, I do a tour of Vietnam and take a cookery, a cooking tour over there.
Christo: Oh, wow.
Donna: Each year, so I’d like to expand on that. And that’s been really good for me because I come back there and cook lots of Vietnamese food and have Vietnamese cooking classes and people really enjoy that.
Christo: I love that. That would be a good trip.
Donna: Yeah, it’s really good fun. And you know, we do a cooking class in every town that we go, every city that we go to. But we also do a lot of other stuff; do a bit of shopping which we all love. I think you know my own product range, to get some more happening with that. But, I always wanted to have another outlet and to franchise, that’s another… But, I guess I don’t want to rush in to that even though I have been in business for 8 and a half years and many people setup a second business or they go to something else pretty quickly in another area. I found that I can stay in control of my business because they’re all in Wingham- in one little town. So, the home ware is two doors up from the cafe and the cookery school is up the hill. If I had to setup a cafe, I think in another town which I’ve been asked to do before, I might find it that I wasn’t giving as much to the one I have now. So that’s something that I have to consider, but eventually when I’m ready, I’d like to franchise the business, a lot of people have asked me to do so. And it’s a great, it’s a great business, Bent on Food is a great name and it could do well in a lot of regional areas, especially.
Christo: Yeah, definitely. I like the obviously, the focus with the area, too. And all I can tell you, you kind of all of your business are two doors down, the home ware‘s two doors down and up the hill… Excellent.
Donna: Yeah, that’s right.
Christo: Excellent.
Donna: Oh, it’s a great town, too. We’re pretty lucky.
Christo: And obviously for your focus and you, obviously, been monitoring things and keeping on top of things that, you know, it’s obviously going to make it easier; we do hear a lot of headaches but different mixed reviews about the franchising thing. But obviously, it sounds like you’re building a fantastic system and something which is really desirable to be a part of. So, sounds like it’s a great way to go.
Donna: Yeah, I just think that it’s probably something that you need to be really ready to do and make sure that everything’s in place in the business, that, you know, I have now. I mean, I got pretty good stuff, I’m lucky but I still like to be involved in the business at the moment.
Christo: Yeah, yeah. And, a question that we love to ask everybody, to kind of put you in the spot a little bit is- what’s the weirdest or funniest thing that has ever happened to you in business?
Donna: Wow, dear.
Christo: Something bizarre that has happened?
Donna: Something bizarre, well, oh gosh. Should I just think about that, because there are lots of bizarre things that happened? You know, apart from having someone bringing their cans of bourbon in to the cafe and getting drunk in the corner and yelling across the cafe before I realized that they were drinking. That was a bit bizarre, when someone getting abusive, I was thinking they were drinking coke but they were drinking bourbon. Well, I guess, I don’t know about that one.
Christo: That’s pretty funny.
Donna: Yelling about his ham sandwich that it was … And when I looked over, I could see that he had all these cans of bourbon sitting just down under his table and he has been drinking them and he was very strange.
There have been a lot of people coming in to the home ware store and ordering a coffee. They would… And they’re surrounded in home ware and they say, “Well, we’d like to order a cappuccino.” And there is no coffee machine here; it’s just two doors down the walk.
Christo: And so, the guy drinking the bourbon, he actually started speaking French too.
Donna: Yeah, he was just going on. We have a few bizarre people in Wingham, anyways. We had some great, that’s why we fit so well.
Christo: Yeah, that’s right. We’ve all got them, don’t worry. This has been excellent. And obviously, you guys are kicking butt. So, I love it. Thank you so much, today. This has been fantastic. So, where would you recommend to send people, where can people find out more about you?
Donna: Okay, we have the website which is www.bentonfood.com.au or Facebook, so it’s just Benton Food- if you look for Benton Food on Facebook. Or if you’re coming up in the mid north coast, you turn off and you can come in to Wingham, it’s not a very long day tour. It only takes 20 minutes to get in to Wingham and then you can get back on to the highway again. What we do, we’d love to see all the listeners come and see us.
Christo: Thanks so much, Donna. This has been fantastic and a lot of gold nuggets for all of our listeners, thank you.
Donna: Thank you very much for having me.
Christo: If you’d like to grow your business and give it a good old kick up the butt, why not go to BasicBananas.Com where you can download a free guide with some marketing strategies that actually work. Go to BasicBananas.Com and you can download your free guide, right now.