Listed: The Limestone Coast’s top nine women who are crushing it in business
From entrepreneurs, women who are dominating the ag industry and those who decided to take the plunge and start their own business – meet women leading on the Limestone Coast.
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From women who are excelling in the ag sector, to those who took the plunge and started their own business, meet the women who are making waves in the Limestone Coast.
To celebrate their achievements, The Mount Gambier News has gathered a lists of the region's top women in business.
Dani Foreman, Boss Skin and Body
Covid has devastated many businesses and though some were able to plug the gaps in their losses by moving online, owner of Boss Skin and Body Dani Foreman was left twisting in the wind.
Despite being racked with fear she would lose the business she had worked so hard to build, Ms Foreman moved all her staff to permanent-part time, to ensure they still had a job.
“We needed to make sure that if we had more lockdowns and whatever else they would be covered – they’ve got families too,” she said.
Formerly Skin PT & Massage, Ms Foreman said she decided to rebrand after making the tough decision to step away from massaging clients herself.
“I’ve had an ongoing shoulder injury for the past 18 months that I can’t keep ignoring,” she said.
“I’m not yet 39, but I have to live in this body for another 40 years … maybe.”
Though it will be sad to leave massage after 10 years, Ms Forman said her shoulder had deteriorated to the point she “could hardly get out of bed in the morning”.
Massage will continue to be a part of the Boss Skin and Body, albeit without Ms Foreman’s hands.
The team is due to move from Mitchell St, Mount Gambier to a much larger space on Sturt St this month.
Ellie Oswald, Treasury Wine Estates
At just 22, Ellie Oswald is already making a name for herself in the agriculture industry as a vineyard supervisor at Treasury Wine Estates.
Living on site at what’s commonly referred to as their eastern block in Penola, Ms Oswald overseas the contractors who work the Northern block.
She also manages technical programs for the estate such as collecting bud fruitfulness data, to determine the yield potential of each block.
“Each block has a tonne amount we need to hit each season — the way you prune alters what you will get,” she said.
Coming from Melbourne, Ms Oswald confessed she did not always envision a career in the agriculture industry.
“I wanted to do astrophysics all throughout high school,” she said.
“I got about halfway through year 12 and I was doing uni extension physics — and it was just stressful and I wasn’t having a good time.
“I started thinking, ‘what do I like? what am I interested in?’”
Ms Oswald landed on conservation and sustainability and decided to pursue a career in an industry where she could “leave the world in a better place than (she) found it”.
After completing a bachelor of agriculture and majoring in plant and soil science Ms Oswald made the daunting decision to move to the regions.
Being surrounded by the positive university community, which promoted women in STEM, Ms Oswald said she was worried about moving to the country after hearing many “horror stories”.
Contrary to her fears, Ms Oswald said people from the country “didn’t bat an eye” when she told them she worked on a vineyard, but people from Melbourne labelled her a diversity hire.
Ms Oswald was shocked at the people who would tell her she “ the only reason I got hired is because I’m a girl and I’m ‘marketable’,” she said.
Nicole Gordon and Michelle Vaughan, Macro Maestra
Two friends who were united by their struggles with health have banded together to create Macro Maestra, focusing on creating healthier versions of classic sweet treats.
Michelle Vaughan lives with Crohn’s disease, an inflammatory bowel disease, while Nicole Gordon suffered from a stroke three years ago.
Mrs Gordon said it was daunting opening a new business, especially in the niche market of macro foods.
“We got it because we were looking for this sort of thing,” she said.
The business launched early this year in March – what was going to start out as a pre-order model has expanded, with the pair moving into local cafe Brew Coffee Bar.
Mrs Gordon explained macro foods was not about being keto or eliminating all carbs, but accurately tracking the ratios of ingredients.
“All our fillings are handmade,” she said.
“Our condensed milk, our lemon curd (it’s) all from scratch.”
Macro Maestra products can be monitored on the Myfitnesspal app, giving customers a detailed breakdown as to what’s in the treat.
“We would like to branch out so that people that have like diabetes and that sort of thing,” Mrs Gordon said.
Their healthy sweet treats can also be purchased from Gym Challenge Meals and BFT Mount Gambier.
Bianca Taylor, The Property Co
Recently celebrating its one-year anniversary Bianca Taylor has been shocked at the speed in, which her real estate firm grew in just 12 months.
After working in the industry for 15 years, Ms Taylor decided to open her own agency so she could have more control on the moral compass and work ethos of her work.
“Real estate isn’t hard, but it’s hard work – we’re dealing with people’s biggest assets and it has to be done properly, you can’t half-arse it,” she said.
Ms Taylor had to work hard to break into the industry competing against the established firms.
“We’ve certainly expanded a lot quicker than we planned on,” she said.
“I genuinely thought it was just going to be myself and Sophie for the first 12 months.”
Ms Taylor said being the new kids on the block meant when they first opened they had to show their point of difference to other firms in the Limestone Coast.
“I couldn’t work off my results. I had to prove my value through my knowledge and my skill,” she said.
“At the start, that's how I proved myself and then as I got all those runs on the board, the proof was in the pudding.”
Though the team is made entirely of women, Ms Taylor said it wasn’t a matter of choosing men over women, but selecting the best candidate.
“When I first started 15 years ago (real estate) was a male dominated industry,” she said.
“Fast forward now 15 years, it’s probably more so dominated by women.”
Tegan Anderson, All you need is sleep
As anyone with young children can attest, one of the greatest challenges out there is getting them to bed.
Tegan Anderson, who works as a midwife at the Mount Gambier and Districts Health Service launched her sleep consultancy business to help trouble sleepers.
From newborns to children aged three to four, Mrs Anderson said there was no one size fits all solution and it’s about working with the child and identifying what techniques will work to break bad sleep habits.
Mrs Anderson, a mother of four was inspired to study the field after she struggled with her youngest.
After three, “I thought I knew what I was doing,” Mrs Anderson said.
“I ended up needing to seek out some sleep consultants support myself, but I had to travel interstate to Melbourne,” she said.
“I just thought it was crazy that we didn’t have anything locally.
“There’s just so many people out there struggling – I felt like our local area needed that.”
Mrs Anderson has only been operating for three months and in that time has already helped 16 families in the Limestone Coast.
“It’s been the most fulfilling job I’ve ever been in – it doesn’t even feel like a job,” she said.
Hayley Neumann, Sinclair Wilson
Having spent just under two decades working as an accountant in the Limestone Coast, Hayley Neumann who is also the Mount Gambier Chamber of Commerce President says accountants are definitely more than just “bean counters”.
Ms Neumann said she and her colleagues know how to fun, despite how serious their job was.
Ms Neumann said numbers always made sense to her and she fell in love with the field after studying it in high school.
“I liked balancing numbers – it’s quite technical,” she said.
In order to stay on top of the constant changes to Australia’s tax laws and rules Ms Neumann said she spends lots of time reading with budget night the biggest night of her year.
“No two business is the same – it’s always very varied,” she said.
“I don’t think that’s what drew me in – but it kept me in.”
The pandemic has presented serious challenges to us, with Ms Neumann describing the heartbreak of seeing her clients struggle, though thankfully none of them lost their business.
“During Covid I would get phone calls before the announcements were even finished,” she said.
Ms Neumann said it was a challenge to constantly stay on top and interpret new legislation as it came in.
“It was a tough time. I really became a counsellor really, because they had no one to talk,” she said.
“I had clients who for first time ever had to tell their staff, ‘sorry. You don’t have a job’.”
Ms Neumann who is a partner at her firm said she’s had to make a lot of sacrifices to reach her position.
“When you get up to the higher management, slash partner levels it is very male dominated – but I’ve probably worked with more females than males in my time,” she said.
Having more flexible working arrangements, such as working from home, would help allow more women to break into higher management roles, Ms Neumann said.
Chelsea Dunning, Brew Coffee Bar
At just 21, Chelsea Dunning launched her own business in the midst of a pandemic, opening on Christmas Eve while looking after her newborn.
Mrs Dunning admits she might be a bit “crazy” but after years of working in the hospitality industry thought it was something she could do.
Nearly two years on the cafe has a core group of regulars that has Mrs Dunning is barely able to sit uninterrupted for a minute before she needs to dart away from the table she’s being interviewed at to serve someone.
Mrs Dunning said Mount Gambier had built a great coffee culture, with all the major cafes independently owned.
“It’s nice to see people making the rounds,” she said.
“My favourite feeling is when people drive here, grab a coffee then they get in the car and go – they’re not coming here because it’s next to Coles or Bakers Delight.”
Not one to sit still for too long, Mrs Dunning has recently bought a coffee van.
“I bought it 3½ months ago – with the idea to send it to a small town and get someone to work it,” she said.
“The idea of it to be ‘Brew’ but on wheels.”
Mrs Dunning decided to shelve sending the van out to other towns for the time being and insteads hires it out for private functions and events.
Meg Bell, Mackillop Farm Management Group
Growing up on a Millicent beef and crop farm, it’s unsurprising Meg Bell gravitated towards a career in the ag sector.
Mackillop Farm Management Group is peak industry body, driving research and development in farming systems, connecting members to that research.
Mrs Bell took over as chief executive in 2018 after the Sherwood fires.
Though it’s been 11 years since she graduated from the University of New England in NSW after studying agriculture, Mrs Bell said it’s been her whole life.
“Growing up on a farm you know, you live and breathe it,” she said.
“In my time in the industry, it‘s been very positive.”
Mrs Bell said it was great to see the number of women studying agriculture at the tertiary level and said particularly in the consultancy sector there were plenty of women.
“(We’re) seeing more and more women working on farms as well, you know, doing a lot of that, like more manual labour and taking on some of the management roles,” she said.
Mrs Bell now lives in the cross border town of Coleraine where she also runs Coleraine Livestock Consultancy with her husband.
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