Special diet companies: Little Bird Organics

Megan May and Jeremy Bennett, founders of Little Bird Organics.

Jeremy Bennett and Megan May founded Little Bird Organics in 2010 and the company now has 75 staff. The firm makes raw, organic packaged food products that are free from gluten, dairy, soy, refined cane sugar, and are also vegan, as well as running three cafes that serve fresh food along the same lines.

Why did you start a business focused on raw, organic foods?

The business really grew out of my wife Megan's love of food, and her research into the benefits of a raw, organic diet on the health of our bodies - which has been fundamentally ignored for a long time.

We weren't hoping or expecting a massive market - more a niche market of those who were interested in making healthier choices. I think the allergy market - people allergic to gluten, dairy and so on - had previously been pretty underserved in terms of the quality of offerings available, so we expected to access this market too.

How have you reached your potential customers in the niche area that you're operating in?

Megan has always been focused on quality and taste as a priority. If we were going to make this 'weird' food, we needed to make it taste delicious or no one would buy it. For those who were on restricted diets, I think this focus on taste proved to be a huge relief for them.

And really, that was our entire marketing strategy - make something so good that your customers do your marketing for you. It means a bit of a slow burn as word spreads, but this was fine for us as a new company, but then the growth can go exponential, as we've discovered.

What kind of growth have you experienced?

We really didn't expect the growth we've had. It's been amazing to see the general public's attitude to food change so much over the last five years, and it's wonderful to think we might have been a part of that.

Our business really started to thrive when we opened our first cafe in August 2012. So our biggest challenge has been running the business as it grows quickly, which has meant continually assessing and revising how we do things as we grow to the next scale. Neither Megan or I had previous experience running a company, so it has been a huge learning curve. The last five years have felt like 15 in terms of the things we've learnt.

What have been the main lessons you've learnt?

'Do things properly and do them once' has been a good one! And the true value of good staff - organisation and communication are the keys for any business.

What's next for the business, and ultimately what would you like to see it become?

We'll keep growing. We now have the ability to increase our packaged products' distribution - we have a bigger making facility now - and we would love to open more cafes.

Our focus this year is to get better systems in place to cope with the next phase of growth. We place a lot of importance on our team, so if we can continue to have happy staff, and provide good service to our customers we'll be happy. Beyond that we are leaving the door open!

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