Kitchen Confidentisal: Vanilla Zulu to fight way out of financial troubles
Despite liquidators being called in, this well-known Brisbane cooking school is trying to trade its way out of money troubles.
QLD Taste
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SHE was forced to call in liquidators last week to her well-known Brisbane cooking school business, Vanilla Zulu Pty Ltd, but owner Mel Alafaci is fighting on, determined to trade her way out of financial difficulties.
The chef and cookbook author said she had taken a loan against her family home in Brisbane’s Newmarket to pay off most of her creditors and was working on a payment plan with others so she could continue her culinary dream.
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“I’m trying so hard to resuscitate the business and keep my staff employed,” said Alafaci, who has seven workers at her Teneriffe-based cooking school that is still trading. “I’m doing the very best I can.”
The native of Zimbabwe, who started the culinary classes nine years ago, said she found herself with money troubles after trying to expand the business in 2018, moving from Wilston into a larger facility in Teneriffe.
“We moved into a bigger premises expecting our business to grow and instead it dried up and we just kept getting deeper and deeper into debt,” she revealed to Kitchen Confidential.
After rebooting the business late last year under the name Vanilla Zulu Culinary Adventures Pty Ltd, Alafaci said things were looking up. Then COVID-19 hit.
But not one to be deterred, the kitchen whiz immediately started remodelling the company, creating additional income streams that she hoped would lead her out of the red and into the black.
Firstly she has taken her classes online and is now reaching customers around the country, she then reduced the prices of her in-person classes to make them more affordable “because everyone is battling too”.
She has also been doing cooking classes with Catholic and Lutheran schools as another revenue stream and is launching a new spice range she hopes will be sold through independent supermarkets to bring in more money.
“What we realised is if we can’t sell enough classes we need another revenue stream and we are trying to get that into retail now,” she said of the culinary products. “The range is based on how I teach at the cooking school which is you don’t have to work too hard to get a round of applause.”
Alafaci said she hoped the community would support her business so she could trade out of trouble and keep her staff in jobs.
“Vanilla Zulu is open and our full team of chefs are still delivering amazing cooking classes,” she said.