Mum turns kitchen hack into big business and saves the planet too

An Aussie mum has turned a tea towel hack into a million dollar business that can also save households up to $2000 a year on food wastage.

Peita Pini creator of The Swag. Picture: Darren Leigh Roberts

At the heart of it, Peita Pini has always been a problem-solver. “I remember back in the day when I used to go out with my girlfriends, all in high heels, and we’d get ‘sore balls’ – as in, the balls of our feet,” laughs the Sydney entrepreneur.

“I used to cut up maxi-pads and stick them to the soles of our shoes, and they were brilliant! So spongy and you could dance all night.” Given that, these days, several best-selling iterations of her maxi-pad idea now exist for heel-wearing partygoers (hello, Party Feet!), Peita was convinced that she wasn’t going to let her next invention go by without backing herself. Enter: The Swag, a produce-storage solution that solves one of the biggest bugbears of modern adulthood –throwing out rotting, soggy veggies from the back of the fridge.

Peita Pini, creator of The Swag, in her Sydney kitchen. Picture: Darren Leigh Roberts.

“I was a busy mum, working full-time, and then coming home to cook dinner and turfing out fruit and veggies that had begun to go off in the produce crisper,” Peita explains. “Having grown up on acreage with parents who wasted literally nothing, I just felt so ashamed. I knew something had to change.” The idea came on a visit to her folks’ place.

“I opened the fridge and there in the veggie crisper was a damp tea towel wrapped around some herbs. Mum told me it buys her an extra couple of days of freshness, and it set me on a journey of figuring out how I could do that with all of my veggies.” Thus began The Swag, a produce storage bag made of 100 per cent unbleached, unseeded cotton that keeps fruit and veggies fresh for weeks longer than storing them in plastic bags.

Make fruit and veg last longer. Picture: Darren Leigh Roberts

Environmentalism starts at home. Picture: Darren Leigh Roberts

With families feeling the pinch of the cost-of-living crisis –particularly in the produce aisles – Peita, who has a blended family of six children, says she’s noticed demand for her products surge in recent months. “The Swag can save households up to $2000 a year on food wastage,” says Peita, “which is massive … it is really critical at this time, and not only for us, but for our children. It’s about our children being able to afford fruit and vegetables.

It’s hard to imagine, but it’s a possibility for many of us, that by 2030 many fruits and vegetables will be unaffordable. So it’s a travesty to think that we’re just throwing them away today.”

While the pandemic threw its fair share of spanners in the works, The Swag has experienced meteoric success. With global distributors, a new range of products, and negotiations to secure a trial with US giant Wholefoods, it’s a far cry from where it began.

The Swag has many uses. Picture: Darren Leigh Roberts.

Such as keeping the drinks chill for example. Picture: Darren Leigh Roberts.

“In the beginning, we used our house as a warehouse,” she laughs, “we literally had boxes stacked up to the ceiling in every room, it looked like a hoarder’s house! I don’t think my husband spoke to me for two weeks when he saw all the stock arrive, but now we thankfully have a third party logistics company and we can move again.” And while Peita credits a belief in her product and exposure to entrepre-neurial parents as gifting her with the chutzpah to actually create The Swag, her children are the momentum driving her forward. “It’s about my children seeing me do what I’m doing, because I had that gift from my parents. Whenever you’ve got a little bit of a side hustle, your kids are watching that, and that creates this belief in them that they can do it, they can innovate and be sustainably-minded.

“That’s what we need our future generations to be – innovative in the sustainability space so that we can pull back from the path that we’re on globally.”