Doing good? It’s a piece of cake
These food industry social enterprises bring a fresh flavour to helping the disadvantaged.
It used to be that doing good took effort. You would volunteer time helping the less fortunate and in return you received a warm fuzzy glow, but that was it.
Now, with the trend of social enterprise permeating the food industry, we get to feel good about helping others and have our cake, coffee or beer too.
Streat is a Victorian social enterprise that trains disadvantaged youth in its cafes, giving them confidence, workplace skills and a reference for future employment opportunities.
Starting in 2010 with a coffee cart and expanding to five cafes across Melbourne including its headquarters in Collingwood, Streat offers a feel-good experience where you can nosh on delicious pastries or something more substantial for breakfast or lunch.
The Collingwood cafe has moved on from its former lives as a brothel and pub and is now a light-filled spot with a kitchen garden for fresh ingredients and a hipster vibe.
At 8.30am on a Sunday, I join others at the counter pointing to items behind glass and inquiring whether they’re gluten-free or vegan.
Chief executive Bec Scott says Streat is about doing as much good as it can with every square centimetre of space it has.
Since 2010 more than 520 youths have been through Streat’s programs.
Often, Scott says, Streat is their last chance after a history of drug or mental health issues.
“What we wanted to do was build an organisation in an industry which has really low barriers to entry,” she says.
Scott says for people who haven’t finished Year 10 or for whom English is a second language, hospitality is a good fit and it can be a stepping stone and help with funding a university degree.
She says some of the program’s participants have gone on to study music, social work and business at university.
“We’ve got kids who have gone everywhere from us, from fine dining to becoming chefs or working in fast food,” she says.
Scott says the team has been fielding requests to expand across Australia but intends to concentrate in Victoria for the next decade and expand to the Dandenong region.
“We’re just getting warmed up,” she says. “We’ve made a really big investment in this state. We want to make sure we’re really shifting the dial here.”
And while Christmas has come and gone, the Good Xmas Trail pulls together a group of social enterprise businesses worthy of support any time of the year, including relative newcomer to the drinks scene the Good Beer Co.
The Good Beer Co sells its Great Barrier Beer across Queensland and online for people looking for, well, a good beer, and to help a good cause.
The company donates a minimum of half its profits to charity, partnering with the Australian Marine Conservation Society for its first beer which was launched last year.
Founder James Grugeon says their success is a case of a good product, the right story and integrity, which in turn has caused the right people to back it.
He says it is important to get the message out about the social enterprise aspect of the beer; equally, he doesn’t want to hit people over the head with it.
“The fact you’re enjoying the beer is really important,” he says.
Crowd-funding helped raise money for the first batch of beer; now the company sells nearly 2500 cartons or 50 kegs a month and the beer is stocked on Hayman Island, Lady Elliot Island, P&O Cruises and by top Brisbane restaurants such as Esquire.