Surge in US sales helps Dreamfarm bounce back from devastating Brisbane floods

The entrepreneur behind a popular kitchen tools and gadgets design business has bounced back from this year’s devastating Brisbane floods thanks to a surge in US sales.

DREAMFARM founder and managing director Alexander Gransbury isn’t alone thinking the last Brisbane floods were the “single worst event” in his life.

But after cleaning up the 1m of water that went through the kitchen tools and gadgets design company’s Albion headquarters in late February the company is now back on its feet.

“We lost months and months worth of stock, we lost our computers, we lost every tool in our workshop and we lost every design, sketch and notebook we’ve ever done. It was devastating but we started shipping orders again two weeks later,” he says

“I have an amazing team. You’ve never seen a bunch of people bind together so quickly and say `here’s a problem, let’s get to the other side as quickly as possible’.

“We didn’t have flood insurance but we had other insurance and just recently we got a bit of money through, but it’s been devastating.”

Gransbury, who launched the multi-award-winning company’s first product in 2003, a coffee grind knockbox called Grindenstein, says 70 per cent of their revenue now comes from the US.

“They obviously weren’t affected by the floods and we’re now doing four times the revenue there that we were doing two years ago. The US is definitely a focus for us moving forward,” he says.

“We don’t have the last financial year accounts sorted but we expect them to exceed our forecasts. I’m very happy how it’s all turned out.”

Dreamfarm founder Alexander Gransbury with the Ortwo (pepper mill).

No worries

INFLATION may be the scourge of the household budget but Sentinel Property Group chief executive Warren Ebert has told Citybeat that “bricks and mortar” are the best protection for investors.

And he reckons the best investment is commercial property.

“This a good time to buy the right assets. Inflation can be good for commercial property, particularly retail assets. The higher the inflation, the more you will see an increase in retail turnover which in turn leads to bigger rent increases,” he says.

“The level of affordable rent a tenant can pay is based upon a percentage of turnover. The higher the turnover the more rent they can pay.”

Sentinel this year bought its largest asset, the Casuarina Square shopping centre in Darwin for $418m and the syndication group is in the market for another large, high yielding shopping centre asset in a key regional area, with its focus on Northern Australia.

“All those cities right up the Queensland coast and into the Northern Territory is where we’ll keep buying,” Ebert says.

Sentinel Property Group CEO Warren Ebert at Casuarina Square.

Game changer

THEY Call it a game changer down Logan way.

LOGAN CITY Council’s Investment Attraction Incentive Fund (IAIF) created more than 1000 jobs in manufacturing, health, medical and tourism infrastructure across the city in 2021-22,

The $635,000 allocated from the IAIF in the financial year generated $448m in capital investment. That equates to about $705 invested in the city for every dollar spent by Council – not a bad return.

Councillor Jon Raven, chairman of the economic development committee,says “Logan is open for business”.

Australia’s largest indoor play centre, Area 51, is the latest business to embrace the

City of Logan. The business is now operating seven days a week, 9am to 9pm, in the former 10,000sq m Bunnings warehouse at 51 Kingston Rd, Underwood.

Logan councillor Jon Raven gets some height on the trampoline while councillor Teresa Lan watches on at Area 51, Underwood.