Usually, the success metrics for a food business are pretty straightforward – and linked to food: taste, quality, guest experience and so forth. But what if it was possible to deliver on all of the above, and go beyond – to offer employment pathways and career opportunities to those who otherwise wouldn’t have them?
There are several social enterprises across Australia who are doing just that, where food isn’t just offering a taste experience, but is quietly changing people’s lives in the background. Not with handouts or charity – although that has its place too – but by empowering them with practical training and jobs.
Here are five such food brands to look out for, and support – so the next time you go out for a meal or order a treat, you know it’s making an impact.
Worthy Cause
A made-to-order cookie business, Worthy Cause employs people with mental illness, trauma and complex histories who struggle to find a place in the mainstream workforce. Founded in 2021by Rick Cohen, who has navigated mental health issues himself for most of his life – including spending time in institutional care – as well as worked in restaurants in Italy and Melbourne, Worthy Cause offers skills training, award wages and a supportive environment to foster a sense of self-worth in marginalised people.
The artisanal cookies, which come in a range of decadent flavours such as chocolate chip, red velvet, Biscoff, peanut butter- and nutella-filled choc chip, are available for retail sale online, as well as through monthly subscriptions, and for corporate orders.
Plate It Forward
You may be familiar with some of the acclaimed restaurants in this group – Colombo Social, Kabul Social, Kolkata Social and Kyiv Social, each showcasing an under-represented cuisine – but what may not be common knowledge is the level of impact the organisation has.
Operating on a Work Integration Social Enterprise model, the restaurants employ people facing barriers, often intersecting, ranging from refugees and asylum seekers and people exiting the justice system, to people with disability, people vulnerable to cultural or age-related discrimination and First Nations people.
They get trained in restaurant service, both in kitchens and Front of House, as well as in catering and events, by skilled professionals. This arms them with hospitality skills they can take into the real world, if they aren’t already employed by the group’s own restaurants.
The organisation also collaborates with leading Australian chefs to provide training in youth justice settings in a program called Second Chance Kitchen.
For Plate it Forward, the deliciousness of the food being pumped out, whether it’s Sri Lankan, Ukrainian or Afghan, is just the beginning.
Livvi’s cafe
Tucked away in a park in Sydney’s Five Dock, Livvi’s Cafe is a coffee kiosk like many others. Except it isn’t. The cafe is not only staffed by people living with disability, it also provides work experience opportunities for students with disabilities, through a Transition to Work program. Part of Touched by Olivia, a charity founded from the heartbreaking loss of a young baby, which runs inclusive playspaces around Australia, Livvi’s Cafe is a cog in the wheel of fostering inclusivity through awareness and connection.
The pride and confidence apparent in the people serving you with a broad smile when you order that flat white or baked treat to go, is sure to make it taste that much sweeter.
Box Divvy
This community food-shopping cooperative is known for helping people conveniently source fresh produce at affordable prices, while reducing food waste. But what may not be common knowledge is how it offers an accessible way to earn for people running the food hubs, known as Hubsters.
For people like Norma*, for example, who has battled homelessness and abuse, running her local Box Divvy hub offers a dignified and flexible self-employment opportunity that allows her to be a parent, and pursue other passions.
While anyone can opt to become a Hubster (not just people from marginalised communities), this social enterprise is using food as a way to help communities in more ways than one.
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All Things Equal
This Melbourne cafe doesn’t just train, employ and empower people with disability, it is taking things to the next level – by scaling their successful training and employment model to bring other mainstream hospitality brands along on the journey.
Whether it’s someone cooking or serving up crowd-pleasing smashed avocado for brunch at the cheery cafe, catering a corporate meeting, or working in hotels like W Melbourne having gone through a personalised transition program, an All Things Equal graduate is proof of how life-changing a considered, alternate approach to hospitality can be.
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