Into the Aisles
Whilst working as a sales manager for an IT company, Cale Drouin bought a failing vegan grocery store and quickly watched as it turned around and grew on to its own two feet. Despite being only one decision, this career change led Cale on to a path within the plant-based space: from distribution, to consultation and currently to the role of co-founder of Australian vegan manufacturing company Cale & Daughters. With 10 years of success in the field, we chat with Cale about his early experiences and the role of failure in providing learning opportunities. We also discuss the importance of marketing to flexitarians, the visions behind sister brands Made with Plants and PlantAsia, partnering with large supermarkets and the personal side of running a business.
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After selling vegan grocery store the Green Edge, Cale reflected on the next thing he wanted to do within the plant-based space.
Cale: “I noticed there were very little available products in supermarkets, so I figured that was where things were going”
As a result, he took to distribution, transporting and selling early products such as Tofurkey and Gardein.
Cale: “It was incredibly hard and I had no idea what I was doing… I had bought a refrigerated van and I was literally driving around to supermarkets knocking on their back door and asking if they’d buy anything from me.
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and I had to do it all in one day, otherwise I’d have to run the van all night to keep things cold until the next morning… it was insane (but so much fun).”
It was during his time working in distribution that Cale really got to form relationships with people. One relationship with Drake’s Supermarkets in South Australia soon blossomed as they had heard about the work he was doing and they reached out to ask for his help designing a plant-based range.
Cale: “We started growing very quickly with new products coming on, we were running around the country hiring staff.”
It was at that point however, when things really began to fall apart.
Cale: “I didn’t have enough money to do it… I had no concept of how much I’d even need to manage a business where I’m paying for containers in advance and only getting paid for them a month after that.
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I very quickly grew that business broke… but it led to the next thing”
Cale went on to talk about the importance of this failure at the start of his journey and the fact that it was a hard but necessary pill to swallow.
Cale: “When you make a decision to put a business into administration it’s a gut wrenching experience but I’m all the better for it.”
It also led to a lot of reflections on his role to play within the Australian plant-based movement.
Cale: “I don’t think I was adding enough value to the system… so it made me start to believe that distributors, especially in large scale, are not the best thing in a place like Australia where we have condensed populations around the country.”
It was at this point in time that he also worked for another company as a consultant, during which he got exposure to large Australian supermarket chains Woolworths and Coles.
Cale: “I was always anti-Coles and Woolworths because they were always the ones that wouldn’t take my products… I saw them as these monsters that were taking advantage of small suppliers.”
Cale: “As I got to know the internal workings of Woolworths more, I started to move past that and realised that this was actually the best place for these sorts of products because it allowed for the unnecessary costs that come from trying to supply products to all these fragmented stores across the country to be avoided.”
Wanting to dive deeper into this topic, we asked Cale for his perspective on the overall plant-based market in Australia, and how this compares to those overseas.
Cale: “The difference between Australia and other countries is population. We have 2 major supermarkets that basically service most of the supermarket trade. In the US there are many different supermarkets with different ranges so there’s definitely more on offer. There also tends to be more manufacturing and products being developed in the United States and Europe because there’s just a bigger population.”
Despite this, he also mentioned that as a whole Australia is doing really well; the live-testing of products in major supermarkets would have been unheard of at the start of his career.
Cale: “Innovation and product development is being pushed internally rather than just being the companies that take the product that’s already been proved to do really well.”
In particular, what’s driving this change is the rise of flexitarianism and encouraging this demographic in product marketing, Cale mentions, is essential.
Cale: “We’re making products that I think vegans are interested in, but the main market is flexitarians: people that are dabbling in this space and are absolutely vital to this market. Even though I’m vegan I prefer flexitarians … they’re going to have a lot more impact on all the things that vegans care about … it’s still not a critical mass to have a big impact.”
Putting this belief into practice, Cale is now the founder of two sister brands Made with Plants and PlantAsia that provide a range of diverse products. Made with Plants began with ready meals, with Cale sharing that finding co-manufacturers was extremely difficult when nobody believed in the vision.
Cale: “You kind of have to start with contract manufacturers that aren’t right for you to begin with just to get something done and as you prove yourself a bit more you can move out to manufacturers that do a better job.”
Cale: “My understanding is that there was no plant-based ready meal available in the mass market until we did that ready meal in Australia… and there weren’t really many globally so it was a huge amount of work to get those right.”
Soon enough, ready meals expanded into other products such as cheeses, mayonnaise, plant-based bacon and more; an expansion process heavily collaborated on with Woolworths.
Cale: “We’re always looking at R&D stuff, we have a partnership with the University of Queensland for some of the food science side of things as well.”
Image: Made with Plants bacon product, sourced from their website.
Something that really stood out during our conversation was also the speed at which Cale and his team are able to introduce new products into the range. Described as a “sell it first and then build it” business model, quick-fire decision making and entry to the market holds contradictory to many other startups and founder philosophies that we’ve heard on the show.
Cale: “We’re in a space when it comes to the development of plant-based products where we need to make reasonably quick decisions; we’re ranging a lot of new products but we need to make decision on when to cut them as well.”
Cale: “Every time that I think about making a product from scratch that I haven’t sold first I think about those days driving around in the van trying to sell stuff to IGAs and it changes my mindset very quickly.”
Cale: “Unless you’ve lived it it’s hard to make that decision because it’s almost unnatural to sell something and then build it, but it’s the way that’s really worked for us.”
A large reason for this is the foundation work that Cale built through his work in distribution and consultation, forming new relationships and gaining an understanding on the network of the Australian mass market.
PlantAsia on the other hand is quite different in that the inspiration behind the brand lays in the flavours and meat alternatives of Malaysia. Any long-term vegan will know the days of going to a local Asian supermarket and digging out seitan and tofu products from large freezers. Having this experience himself, Cale recognised the value of these and thought of ways in which they could be brought into the mainstream.
Cale: “I just jumped on a plane to Malaysia with essentially no plan… I got some addresses and started knocking on doors to find out who was making these products.”
Cale: “I got told no a lot of times… but eventually found someone who understood what I was trying to do. They’re a brilliant partner in Malaysia and they not only help us manufacture stuff under our brands, but also facilitate relationships with a bunch of other manufacturers that do other stuff throughout the country.”
Cale went on to mention the importance of this startup in the impact it’s had on partners in Malaysia, who similarly to him, are determined and hopeful in seeing people switch to more plant-based diets.
Cale: “It’s one thing to sell things into Asian grocery stores and have a small impact; the impact we can have by packaging these products properly, using Woolworth’s margins, dealing with the distribution chain has changed the volumes of products that they’re making and people’s eating choices.”
Image: PlantAsia products, sourced from their website.
Cale’s advice to aspiring entrepreneurs?
Cale: “I got invited to guest lecture at Griffith and I found it very strange, even the idea of having a course on entrepreneurship and how you’d even begin to teach that.”
Cale: “For me you have to be willing to take chances and be ready to fail… that’s the foundation.”
Cale: “And have that drive... if you don’t have that drive, that feeling inside of you that there’s something not right about your life if you’re not pushing the edges of things, if you’re happy to stay inside the boundaries of what society is doing at the moment don’t get involved in entrepreneurship… ever.”
Cale: “If you have the inner drive to change things and move society forward, that’s the main thing.”
He also mentioned the importance of understanding your determination and having the persistence to move forward.
Cale: “Not everyone you know is going to understand what you’re doing and it will definitely have an impact on your personal life, so it comes back to the same thing… you’ve got to know that this is what you want to do.”
Cale & Daughters is currently moving into the food service space, to learn more you can follow Made with Plants and PlantAsia on Instagram.