‘I bloody did it’: 30-year-old Aussie reveals huge business success after struggling in her career

When Maddie was told she didn’t pass her probation she felt like she couldn’t breath and burst into tears.... then it happened again.

When it comes to success, you often only hear about the good stuff, but a young Aussie has shared all the failures it took before her business finally took off.

Maddie Gleeson, 30, has always been a social person. Throughout high school, she cruised through and embraced hanging out with her mates over cramming for maths exams.

She got an ATAR result she was unhappy with, but she was saved by the fact that she’d scored early acceptance into university to study psychology.

Ms Gleeson studied at Bond University in Queensland, and she fast-tracked her psychology degree in order to complete it within two years.

She finished her first year, and then in her second. Her boyfriend at the time shattered her confidence when he told her she was “too dumb” to become a psychologist.

“It just sat in my soul,” she told news.com.au.

“A few weeks later, I was doing a biological psychology class, which is more math-based, and I was like, ‘he is right, this too hard for me’, and I changed degrees.”

She quit her degree over a boyfriend's awful comment. Picture: Supplied

Maddie ended up doing a degree in journalism which she loved. Picture: Supplied

MORE: Can I be fired for that?

One of the only reasons the young Aussie woman stayed at university instead of dropping out altogether was that her father insisted on it, so she swapped and studied journalism.

From there, Ms Gleeson got a job at a local paper on the Gold Coast, which she loved, but ended up moving back to her hometown of Melbourne.

The university graduate landed herself a fancy job at a PR agency – the kind where everyone had designer handbags and the right haircut. She’d just come back from living a fairly chill lifestyle in Queensland, and recalled it had been a culture shock.

“It was very fancy. Everyone was dressed up and had the right bags, and it was like a job where you sat at your desk from 7am and spent the entire day responding to emails,” she explained.

Ms Gleeson said she hated it, but she wanted it to work. She tried really hard and brought all these ideas to the table, but she was basically told to be quiet.

“I didn’t even make it past probation,” she said.

“I think their reasoning was I had made a typo in an email, and they said I didn’t have the right attention to detail.”

She just wanted to be successful and work hard. Picture: Supplied

Being fired twice was crushing and made her burst into tears. Picture: Supplied

MORE: Know your rights: Can I be fired on probation?

For a graduate still trying to find her feet in the workforce, it was crushing.

She was new to her career and wanted to excel, so she bounced back and found another job in PR. Once again, she didn’t make it past probation.

Ms Gleeson was told she had great ideas but no idea how to execute them. She remembers that when she was working in her second PR job, she constantly felt like she was “drowning” and couldn’t figure out her role.

“It was devastating,” Ms Gleeson said.

“The first job I think I was relieved, but the second I was devastated, I remember sitting there with the HR person and bursting into tears and driving home and feeling like I couldn’t breathe.”

Ms Gleeson was in her early 20s at the time and feared that she’d never make anything of herself. She believed her ex-boyfriend was right: and she was “too dumb” and not good at anything.

“It felt like the end of the world,” she recalled.

She started a cheese platter business. Picture: iStock

The world didn’t end, and she snagged a job in marketing for a major company and made it past her probation period, but Ms Gleeson was restless.

She ended up starting a cheeseboard company as a side hustle, and it “blew up overnight”. But the Melbourne local said it didn’t succeed by accident.

She called over 500 companies with the pitch that, instead of tiny sandwiches at corporate events, she could create incredible grazing platters.

Two people liked her pitch, and from there, it snowballed. She catered at events for major brands such as Mecca, Nike, and Lululemon, and the cheeseboard business took off.

“I remember calling my dad, and saying ‘I’m going to quit this job and start making cheeseboards’ and I remember hearing the sigh though the phone,” she said.

“This poor man had lived through me dropping out of my degree, getting fired twice, and I finally had passed my probation and now I was going to quit to make cheese boards.”

Ms Gleeson said watching her business grow was a huge boost to her confidence. She felt amazing and validated, as though it was proof she wasn’t “too dumb”.

“I thought, ‘I’ve bloody done it!’ I’ve shown them all and it was such a confidence booster.

“Then the pandemic hit, and I tried really hard to adapt, but I ended up in a situation where we were set up for corporate events and doing 15-metre grazing tables, not one box here or there.

“It didn’t work and our overheads were too significant.”

She saw a gap in the market and pounced. Picture: Supplied

The dried fruit business has taken off. Picture: Supplied

The business owner knew she had to pivot.

In the middle of lockdown, when homemade cocktails became popular, she noticed it was hard to find dried fruit to put in them.

Which is exactly how her business, I Am Thirsty was born. She started selling jarred dehydrated fruit, which can be used for cocktails, as a garnish or even as a snack.

Ms Gleeson said the idea took off, and Dan Murphy’s approached her to sell her range with them.

Once again, she felt like she’d cracked the big time.

“I was like ‘I’ve bloody done it again’,” she said.

Even with that success, though, she couldn’t have imagined what would happen next.

Three years ago, Ms Gleeson received a message from someone at Woolworths asking if she’d like to stock her dehydrated fruit range with the supermarket giant.

The offer was originally for one store, but now the I Am Thirsty range is stocked in over 100 stores, and the business owner said it changed everything.

“I was going from running a cowboy operation and doing whatever I want when I wanted to everything having to be perfect,” she explained.

“I’m playing with the big dogs now.”

She said she feels like she’s playing with the big dogs now. Picture: Supplied

She’s worked so hard to get to where she is. Picture: Supplied

Ms Gleeson said the success of being stocked in a major supermarket chain has meant she’s handed over production to another company while still owning 100 per cent of the business and can concentrate on building the brand.

It’s also meant she’s not working seven days a week and can take a break, go on a holiday, or even work from overseas. It’s been incredible.

The dehydrated fruit business is now a six-figure success story and absolutely thriving, which is more than she could have dreamt possible.

Ms Gleeson said the first time she saw her products stocked in Woolworths, it was such a gobsmacking moment.

“It was one of the best moments of my whole life. I felt really proud of myself for the first time ever and I felt like I’d won,” she said.

“I’d felt like I’d proved people wrong anyone that ever fired me or told me I was dumb.”

Originally published as ‘I bloody did it’: 30-year-old Aussie reveals huge business success after struggling in her career