Nourishing by Sally

Nourishing was born on the sunny Gold Coast in November 2014…which seems like a lifetime ago! It all started when Sally was working in a health food store and was continuously asked questions about healthy recipes and baking. She would direct customers to ingredients which they could only buy in big bulk bags at the time, and they would leave with a million dollars worth of ingredients and spend ages in their kitchen to make a single batch of energy balls. It just didn't seem worth their time, energy or money, so the idea of pre packed energy balls mixes came to life. Everything the customer needed was in the one bag ready to go.

Sally got these innovative packs designed and manufactured, but needed to market them to get the word out there. Using her baking and photography skills, she created epic recipes and content using the energy ball pre-mix as the base of raw cakes. The images looked pretty drool-worthy and soon local cafes were messaging and requesting to purchase them! So we happily obliged. At first we sold them both ready-to-eat raw cakes and energy ball mix packs for them to make themselves, but before we knew it we were making their energy balls too and the packs naturally phased out. Safe so say we haven’t looked back since!

The team grew, the product offering grew, we moved into a commercial kitchen and things have been evolving ever since. Our focus was and always has been creating the most delicious healthy plant based treats around…which now includes energy balls, mini cakes, slices, choc bars and mega celebration cakes. We are constantly innovating and creating dreamy flavours and new creations, and love that we have converted so many people to a healthy way to get their treat fix. Even our customers’ partners and children are hooked…everybody loves it!

One of our biggest hurdles was scaling production. With demand increasing, our goal was to produce on a larger scale but keep the standard and attention to detail super high. With lots and trial and error (like lots), plenty investment in new machinery, learning new systems and processes, learning how to manage a team, and of course the bucket loads of sweat and tears…we got there and were able to increase our output while creating the same delicious (and sexy looking) goodness. Another challenge shared with many local small businesses has been the current global pandemic, but that’s a whole other story. Throw in Sally having two babies, and Dan and his partner having one too…the juggle has been real!

But the growth and wins have been so super sweet. Our cakes have now span far and wide and we are continuously working on ways to reach even more people Australia wide. We’ve partnered with multiple distributors in QLD and beyond, contract manufactured, innovated, grown our product offering, learnt some epic tips and tricks, streamlined our processes, become a HACCP approved facility and grown our amazing online community on social media. We’re also pumped to have achieved a healthy work/life balance.

Through the ups and downs, we’re so grateful for this journey, and most importantly, to be on it together. Family, food, health, happiness are our biggest values and we feel we have been able to incorporate them all into NBS. People often ask how we manage working together as siblings, but we wouldn’t have it any other way and it has made our relationship stronger than ever…we stick in our own lanes task wise, trust each other, are always having a laugh, always have something to talk about (even once we go home for the day) and are both so genuinely excited about the business. We’re smashing our goals and are so excited for what the future has in store for NBS.

Thank you to those who have shared this journey with us and to all of you who have supported our dream along the way. The word grateful just doesn’t cut it.

Dan & Sally Robbie x