Oli Le Lievre 0:00
The Better Business series is supported by the farm business Resilience Program through the Australian Government's future drought Fund, and the New South Wales Department of Primary Industries. Across these next few weeks and episodes, we're going behind the scenes and chatting to some people who are making some serious impact in inroads across Australia. And they're not just limited to agriculture. Our aim is to uncover what's worked for them, discuss their learnings, and through their stories provide ways for you to get some of those aha moments or things that might be able to benefit you, your business and your community. Well, G'day, and welcome back. This is our third episode in the Better Business series. But it is episode one with this friggin rock star of a person. I'm ecstatic and so excited to get the chance to sit down with Grace Brennan, the CEO and founder of the extraordinary buy from the bush, Grace grew up in Sydney. But after falling in love with a farmer, she made the move to the western plains of New South Wales, where home to her now is on a sheep and cropping farm in JinJin, New South Wales with her husband, Jack, and their four kids. In Episode One, Grace, she has more about her background, including her work in community development, and even being a co founder of an ag tech recruitment app. To begin with, though, we get some context as to hers and Jack's background, the early days in his family farming, business, and the inclusivity and opportunity to be a voice at the table. Even in those really early days. As we dive into the bar from the bush story, we chat about the difference between strategic thinking, for strategic planning, the initial systems and processes they build the founding team, how they approach decision making in a rapidly changing environment. And gosh, if you know their story, holy moly, did they grow quickly. And the importance of building a team bigger than just those in the business. So there is a lot to unpack here Grace's story and how she opens it up is incredible. I'm sure there's gonna be plenty of takeaways in this one for you. Guys, we are very keen to chat about the bottom of the bush business, the stay in the bush business, how it's all evolved. And I think, yeah, maybe some of the learnings and different things that you've picked up along the way that I can learn from the others can maybe be very self serving this isn't it for me.
Unknown Speaker 2:13
It always is with Business Oregon.
Oli Le Lievre 2:15
So great. Whereabouts are you joining us from today?
Speaker 2 2:19
I am in my office in Warren, which is the cotton illustrated office. We there's a few women in Warren that share it. And for anyone who doesn't know, Warren it's about an hour from Dubbo and surrounded by farming dryland cropping, red meat, a little bit of cotton. And I live on a property with my husband who barns all of those things. And his family's been in this area for a few generations now. So he's born and bred, and I inherited God's country through him.
Oli Le Lievre 2:49
What's your favorite part of all the favorite thing about Warren,
Speaker 2 2:52
it's such a cliche, I feel like everybody says this. But living in a rural community means that you absorb insight from the greatest people on earth. I think, for me, I have the best childhood in the city. I'm not somebody who kind of, you know, rolls their eyes and says bloody City Slickers. Or, I still love it, I still call Sydney home as well. But there is something that you gain when you move to the bush, which is pretty special. And it's, it's this wisdom and approach to life that is unique to living in the middle of nowhere. And I think that's what I love the most. So the characters and what they offer.
Oli Le Lievre 3:31
And I love how through your work your businesses, and even just, I'll say your voluntary pieces that you write for various newspapers and things you really do, I guess, you channel that inner city kid, but then actually, in a way, which is one really relatable and articulate of this is the world of rural Australia and the opportunities and the challenges. But actually, here's how it isn't in a way that people can really connect them and rely to, which is incredible.
Speaker 2 3:55
I hope so. But do you notice that they're not voluntary? Because you can actually get paid to write when you go? So people who like to put pen to paper? No, actually, a lot of them are voluntary. But when I first got my first request for an invoice, I was over the moon because there's no greater thing than sharing your story and the things that you find interesting with others. And the idea that somebody might pay me to do it was quite astounding. But you're right, it is there is some privilege in and you occupy the same space, that idea that you've been led into something kind of special. And I feel really strongly that everybody should care about rural and regional Australia, or particularly rural Australia. I think it's quite distinct from the regional centers. And if I can make, you know, a few people in the city care more than I think the next crisis that comes along, they're kind of more empowered and enabled to help in a meaningful way.
Oli Le Lievre 4:48
Maybe giving me my first lesson already. I'll just start taking my little notes on the side. But you mentioned that Jack's family has been in and around the area for quite some time. Is he working in the family business or where is he working today?
Speaker 2 4:58
Yes, so when we moved out out here, we I moved to a family farm, Jack took on a portion of, of a family partnership. And so we moved into family farming. And we had that baptism of fire. We got engaged and went on our honeymoon. And we've grown the biggest crops that probably ever seen. And when we got back got wiped out by flood, and then the same thing happened the next year. So real understanding of the lack of control that comes with farming, sometimes, I've seen seen all the upside, as well. But yeah, we, after a short, relatively short time on the family farm, Jack took a job with a corporate agriculture company managing the farm. And so we've seen both farming ag and family farming ag and corporate AG, which has been quite a unique sense to straddle, I suppose.
Oli Le Lievre 5:49
And so today, I think what we're keen to explore is actually a little glimpse under the hood of this bar from the bush business. Would you say having jack in system doesn't sound right. But in that corporate business, which has systems and processes and whatnot, have there been little snippets of gold that you've gone? Oh, that's genius, I'm gonna borrow that for by from the bush?
Speaker 2 6:08
Certainly, yes. I also think when I was in my mid 20s, I think, when I moved to Oregon, and he was taking on the family farm at that age, it was slightly ahead of most of our friends around us and neighbors, many of them were still under the guidance of, you know, the family structure. So we jumped headfirst into the business of farming and learnt a lot in a really short period, and I was coming from nothing, you know, no knowledge of farming at all, and suddenly was thrust into it. And was really inspired by having that little taste of the business of farming and learning through Jack, just how complex it is, and the broad skill set. And really, the dream was to stay on that family farm and make, you know, grow it into a base like every young young farmer wants to, but making the really difficult decision to go into corporate and for us opened up a wonderful kind of window into approaching farming and in really different way. And as you said, lots of systems processes, but also all this administrative support analytics, that the kind of planning element of corporate AG, all of those things that I think probably sophisticated family farms do. But we weren't doing any sort of kind of structured way. So yeah, sometimes we reflect on the idea that if the order had been the other way around, the skill set that Jack would have taken into that family farm would be really different. But I think like so many people, after getting a degree, he wanted to kind of jump straight into it and get started. But yeah, it has been a learning curve in the best possible way. And also, I'm not to say that I think with that comes when you step into corporate Ag, and I'm kind of speaking on his behalf, because I don't work in the business. But having had family farming experience, you take a whole heap with you into corporate, like his approach is incredibly valuable, I think, having come from that family farming context, as well. So there's great gifts on both sides.
Oli Le Lievre 8:08
And you as well, mid 20s, but you'd had a few different jobs. So you're actually coming with a whole other unique skill set as well into the family business, which would have added, like a really interesting, dynamic and perspective at the table, which they probably may not have had otherwise.
Speaker 2 8:22
Well, like so many women that didn't move out here I had, I think we got together really young were teenagers when we got together. And I think subconsciously I had started to shake any sort of career around what is possible in a rural community. So I chose a university degree that I thought might have been applicable if I was living in a rural community, because I kind of knew I'd end up with Jack. So I did land here with a skill set. But I will say it was somewhat affected by the fact that I knew I was moving to the bush. And I say that because I think there is a bit of a problem with the perception of what is possible when you move to a rural community. And I think I had a really limited understanding of what was possible. And I was interested in community development. And I knew that I could do that out here. But I probably didn't think I could do much else. So when I got here, I was visiting Jack I hadn't moved yet. I was one of the first visits, he kind of moved into a house and a separate property. And he wanted me to come and have a look that would be our home when I got here. And his dad called and said he was coming down from their place. He wanted to have a chat with me. He wanted to just kind of introduce me to what I was informed and to understand the numbers and understand what Jack was taking on. And we weren't engaged. We weren't married, and I just had this allergic reaction. I was like, No, thank you. I'm not getting together with your dad and having a cup of tea and talking numbers. So it was just, it was so foreign to me. To me. It was all his business, their business. None of my business. I didn't need to sit with the numbers. Culturally, that wasn't something like a world that I'd come from. In fact, it was the opposite. My dad ran a small business but numbers just we didn't talk numbers. We into a business really. So I had a bit of a reaction to it. And then slowly but surely, and Jack's dad was kind of inspired in the sense that he really believed in involving me in some of the business and asked him my opinion. And I remember even before, you know, when I was a 16 year old visiting the farm, he'd say, now I've got this problem, what do you reckon about it? And that was his, he was a natural teacher. And he was interested and curious and asked a lot of questions of me. So I think I was very lucky in that way. And I did, I suppose, offer something unique. In the sense I remember going to this family planning meeting we sat was, you know, some big meaty stuff that we were talking about succession planning and other things. And at the end of the meeting, and the consultant had kind of given us a big nugget of, you know, these are your options. You got to make some choices. And then we walked out of the office and that Jack said, Okay, see you later. And Jack's parents, Okay, see you later and walked in opposite directions. I was like, hang on a minute, come back, then we need a coffee. Do we need to like debrief What are we gonna do? And they all kind of shrug their shoulders and said, okay, yeah. Would you like to talk about it? I was like, Yeah, I'd like to talk about it. That's kind of major. And we laughed, and then we went and sat and had a cup of tea and discuss things. And I think it's kind of an example of how culturally they would have perhaps kind of swept under the rug and kept moving. But I really needed to hash things out. And ultimately, I think that might have been a valuable contribution.
Oli Le Lievre 11:25
And quite courageous by you, as well, in the sense of good news just to go be quiet, by my bit in that business, but also very progressive of his parents as well to go Yeah, I
Speaker 2 11:35
think I'd been empowered by Jack and by his parents to have a voice at the table, though never, even as I said, I came with no industry specific knowledge. But they would always ask me, you know, what are your thoughts? It wasn't necessarily going to be adopted my suggestion, but I certainly had a voice at the table. And in fact, yeah, I think we also did a, in cases as interesting to people, we did a program called strategic focus through principle focus. And the idea was that, you know, it's kind of a simulated board environment, we went and joined other farming businesses in a board and met semi regularly. And that was a quite an empowering process for me also, to kind of come up to speed on the numbers on some of the kind of key issues, key challenges, not just in our farming businesses, but in others, and received that kind of p LED support. So yeah, there'd been a few kind of steps toward me feeling like I could have some influence in the family buying business. But still, to this day, I still think it really has been Jack's baby, I've always felt quite committed to having an off farm income as well.
Oli Le Lievre 12:43
And that's coming various forms. You did co found a little recruitment thing called ag draft, was this the opening? And I guess the opportunity for you where you go, actually, there's more opportunities out here than just the community development, I can have an impact in bigger ways.
Speaker 2 12:57
No, it wasn't a conscious choice. I was at home. And I think I might have been having a I think I might have been on maternity leave. But Jack's business analysts was visiting Ella, and she was pitching this idea at a pitch fest. And she was telling us about it. And Jack and I had had experienced this problem of trying to recruit staff into agriculture. I'd been on the phone to universities trying to kind of recruit people. And I was really interested in the concept of an employment platform for AG. So I just over the 24 hours, she was staying at the farm to do his business analytics, started to talk with her about this pitch and was really interested in and there's some really, you might not get it, but there's some pretty strong alignment between getting community buy in in a community project and getting customer buying in a startup context. So applying that experience to a startup pitch was really exciting and interesting for me. So I just helped her kind of sounded out ideas. And then ultimately, she won that pitch based and came back and asked me to work with her. So it was, you know, fortuitous, you know, being motivated by that problem and having an opportunity kind of land in my lap. And then it certainly did give me that first taste of online and building an online platform and the startup culture and running lean and all of those things.
Oli Le Lievre 14:12
Perfect conduit. Let's chat more about ball from the bush at that point you just made before about community buying and customer interaction success. How did you approach it with barfing the bush?
Speaker 2 14:22
Well, it was a social media account, first and foremost. So really, the mechanism for engaging people was via social media. And then beyond that via PR. And really, I was quite intentional in the message I was putting out to people. We have some incredible products and incredible small businesses in rural Australia. And if you invest in them, if you choose to buy from them this Christmas, then you will actually be investing in the future of that rural community and kind of, I suppose selling a really big message in a very small and bite size way. So it was through Social media, engaging photos, sharp copy, you know, sometimes a bit of a dry sense of humor, and really being inclusive trying to kind of build this community driven response to crisis rather than anything from the top down.
Oli Le Lievre 15:14
And so that was a highly strategic or was this bar from the bush thing, something you'd fold up one day and then just kind of gone boom? Or did you actually sit on it and take time to then build that plan?
Speaker 2 15:24
No, it was Yeah, it wasn't strategic. I think sometimes there's a difference in strategic thinking versus strategic planning. Like every thought was strategic along the way, everything was intentional, but nothing was planned. And it was act now think later, very much. So I, one morning was listening to a radio interview about the drought. And it was frustrating felt like it was kind of skipping over something really important, which was the lived reality of drought and beyond the paddock beyond men in in the paddock, and on small businesses, on households on women especially. And so I wanted to communicate that and I began writing a letter. And then halfway through the letter, I thought, I don't even know who this is to and what it's for, and what my call to action is. And so I closed the letter, and I opened Canva. And I created a logo for buy from the bush and then created an Instagram account and literally went from there. But the idea had come from somebody else say I'd shared something on Facebook, about a small business in Warren and said, you know, they don't have an E commerce site, but you can just message them on Instagram and you'll be supporting beautiful business in a drought affected community. And somebody commented our you know, we're doing a buy from the bush, Kris Kringle for Christmas in the family art. Thanks so much for introducing me to this business. So that was the seed of an idea. And yeah, it was just tested out, see what happens.
Oli Le Lievre 16:43
And so the initial point, the Instagram exploded, didn't it literally, overnight, the lead up to Christmas, it was just whack. We use scurrying, trying to build platforms and things of you actually just go well, let's just keep it simple and just be the little connector.
Speaker 2 16:56
Yeah, that was the initial thought. So I had thought that was just be friends and family in the city. I'll just introduce them to beautiful businesses around and these towns out here. And it grew so much then became this kind of instant funnel, people just use the hashtag and tagged by from abortion, we had this instant funnel of businesses that we could showcase. And the fun part was choosing the beautiful things that I thought people in the city might like. And that was all quite intentional and curating a feed that felt special and impressive. So that it had that natural morality, I suppose on socials. And there wasn't really an instinct to build anything beyond social like as an Instagram and Facebook account. And eventually a friend came on board, because what we were learning as we did PR with access an audience who don't use social media, they wanted a landing page and wanted a website. They were an older audience that hear about us on TV, and they had nowhere to go if they didn't use Instagram and Facebook. So we built initially a very simple landing page on Squarespace. And it was just a family friend who got in touch and said, I know a few things about building a website, you want me to build you one. So if you did it in a day, and we kind of couldn't keep up with the demand of adding businesses to that landing page. So it was bare bones. And it was kind of suboptimal in lots of ways. But it just did the trick. And I think when we built it, we had a huge amount of hits in the first week. So it was very much valuable having that landing page that told people what we were what we were trying to achieve. Was it ever overwhelming like
Oli Le Lievre 18:25
you started this as a let's connect the dots and bring businesses in and then it's gone whack another opportunity. Wax. I like the original purpose, which was connect people to incredible Bush businesses to support community development. Was there a lot of pressure building up in actually as the platform and demand grew to go? Oh, my God, there's all these people interested? How do I get them connected?
Speaker 2 18:46
It was overwhelming, but not stressful. So I think it was nonstop work. And really from sunup to very late at night, I'd be working on this, but it was all fun. And it was all upside and I didn't really feel the pressure or stress internally or externally. I think the only thing was when it became so successful. Then I had this, I wanted to make sure I was spreading the visibility across as many small businesses as possible. And people were in a pretty, you know, in some cases, they were pretty desperate. So there was some, I suppose natural tension around, you know, can you include us? We haven't been included yet. Or, you know, our community needs it. You know, initially I wanted to showcase really small communities in some of the bigger communities were saying, well, that's ridiculous. We have all the overheads and you know, it's expensive to do business here. So it was an evolving based and likewise, we were going off the government drought map and only including businesses in those drought affected areas. And then as the bushfires hit and then COVID hit, we had to kind of reevaluate that also in in terms of kind of broadening the scope of inclusion. So I wouldn't say that the overwhelm was flattening, in fact, it was kind of energized. Seeing, because what I've learned from when you are so busy, and there's so much traction, you know, having been in a startup before, I know how much you need traction, and you want traction, and we had it, and it propels you forward in such a kind of productive way. And I think there's no time for self indulgent nerves or, you know, questioning these big opportunities or big interview requests would come in, and I wouldn't hesitate. I would just, I was in that headspace of saying yes, and thinking about it later. And I think it's so valuable. If only I could, you know, simulate that three years on because I think it can be highly productive, highly effective.
Oli Le Lievre 20:38
Just become hot, like, hyper efficient, don't you really, in terms of just, there's no option it needs to get done. So it's gonna get done. And
Speaker 2 20:45
exactly. And there's no overthinking it. I think some of you know, founders, often, self doubt can be so crippling, there's no room for self doubt. When in everything so busy.
Oli Le Lievre 20:55
So tell me on that on that decision making piece, obviously, I think you said before that strategic thinking, which was always happening in the background, are you someone who very quickly goes, Okay, actually, no, that decision I need to make? And then has that ability just to make it and keep moving forward?
Speaker 2 21:10
No, not typically, I do dwell and think on things quite a lot. But in the case of buy from the bush, it was a particularly agile environment, because it was me and one other friend, Millie Fisher, who was working with me, and neither of us really needed to consult each other that much we knew what we were trying to achieve. I could say yes, on the fly. Decision making was certainly kind of it was unencumbered, I suppose. And we had a really clear purpose, which was to build a platform as big as possible. It wasn't about money making, it didn't need to be highly strategic, or kind of acting on behalf of these other businesses. So it made decision making pretty easy because the purpose was so clear. Beyond that, though, I'm somebody who does like, I rely on gut instinct quite a lot for decision making. But I do see one things I like to consider. So at
Oli Le Lievre 22:03
what stage did it or hasn't even told me, it hasn't go from being this platform, very purpose driven, not questioning that at all, but into going okay, now, we're shifting to become a business.
Speaker 2 22:15
Yeah. So early on, we had these partnerships with PayPal and visa, and so many other and Mehta, who was then Facebook, and lots of other interested parties that were getting in touch. And it was a little bit of like, the challenge was filtering the good offers from the bad offers in a way. And some partnerships felt really right, and others felt more challenging and less kind of, it felt less clear on what we were going to get from that arrangement and whether it was kind of driving us towards our ultimate purpose. So those partnerships also brought to us a number of opportunities in order to commercialize the business. And for the first year, it was all about a social media campaign. But the workload was unsustainable. And I was clear that either we kind of generate some sort of revenue, or we wind up and say that was lovely, we need to move on and get some rest. What arrive. Exactly what also happened in that time was COVID. So we actually have lots of plans on the table. And we're making pretty strong progress towards commercializing the business. And then there was just one week in COVID, where every deal, every kind of collaboration and deal just got cancelled. But these email, phone call email phone call saying, you know, we better wait, nobody knows, like, globally, what's going to happen. And it also coincided with me, I was about to have a baby, I think the next week, so it felt kind of fortuitous that, okay, this was nice. It kind of felt like by from the bush, it may be the moment had passed, maybe I could just go and have my baby and come out the other end. But of course, when it did come out the other end, that's such a bad expression to use, we need to have a baby, I meant when COVID came out the other end, IT landscape looked a little different. And in fact, the interest in investing, local supporting small domestic travel, all of those things kind of presented new opportunities. And so stay in the Bush became something that looked like it should move from the social media account to a website and to ramp that up because international travel was locked down. And I just felt strongly that if we were going to do that, we couldn't do it for free. We could not set up another website and have businesses listed for free because even though we buy from the bush, we were so clear on the purpose, it was still problematic. Because once you build a website, for example, with the buy from the bush website, you build a website and tell people we're going to showcase your businesses in this 380 businesses that want their business listed their images, uploaded their details, you know, edited every now and again. It's this workload that doesn't make sense. So we stayed in the bush we launched this directory of rural accommodation on a pretty Bay sixth sight, but we charged businesses a subscription fee to be listed. And that was our first foray into kind of pay per use, I suppose. And then, at the same time, one of our key partners in Paypal kind of got back in touch, eager, probably more eager than ever to support our organization. And their interest had always been in a marketplace model which suited us because ultimately, what we want to do was leverage this really short term opportunity that we saw it as we had all these eyeballs on buy from the ocean, that whole customer base that wanted to shop from these talented businesses. So if we could build a marketplace and generate revenue every time somebody added to cart, then it seemed like a pretty good model to us. So the partnership with PayPal kind of moved us in that direction, we made the decision to go into a business model, which included both commission and subscription, and ultimately kind of brought in some revenue to keep the business going and built infrastructure around this idea that we'd had to crisis proof the bush that I will say, there were other opportunities that I didn't feel were right. So that transition to commercialization, it's imperfect, but it was the most kind of actionable and productive option on the table at the time. And that's how I made the decision. And also, the relationships I had with Pay Pal were really strong, and I kind of trusted the work we've done together before, and believe that they understood our mission really well. So it felt good.
Oli Le Lievre 26:29
That's incredible. And so I'd love to know, did you find that through these partnerships, they were so onboard, having worked with you before, and believing not only from your end, but also their end, in terms of wow, what we can do is actually going to be incredibly good for community, it's going to be incredibly good for business. Did you find that you actually then all of a sudden had like your team expanded beyond just yourself a million, whoever else might have been involved at this stage to actually go, these people honestly feel like they're on the bus with us? And they are part of our team?
Speaker 2 26:58
Yes, absolutely. It varied, depending on the partnership and the particular partner. But yeah, in the best case scenarios, absolutely. And I think with each partnership, the value exchange was different. So you know, in some cases, I could partner with an organization that would bring the capacity building element for community, so that they could bring insight for the small businesses and like, and then other businesses, and in the case of the marketplace, joining forces with Pay Pal, it was literally sometimes there were, you know, 20 people on a call, and Millie and I at my kitchen table, and we did suddenly grow into obese overnight and have all these people. And what it did for us was to make us not just incredibly accountable to the partner and to the process, and that, you know, project outcomes, but also it was teaching me some of those processes along the way. Like I was learning about campaign durations, some of the best practice in terms of launching a PR campaign, even just, you know, the whip, I didn't know what a whip was until five around the bush. So a work in progress meeting was run like a flipping like it was serious business working through that with document each meeting. And it was, I don't know, it was an education in corporate structures overnight. And it was really powerful for me. So yes, it felt like I was getting a team I certainly was getting and that was intentional. Again, whatever I had said no to a partnership that just felt like putting our logo on something and getting money for it. This one was about accessing smart, practical, pragmatic money. In a way in that partnership, it was about getting an organization that knew something about marketplaces knew something about e Commerce, also believed in our mission. And I think we had a pretty explicit kind of relationship in terms of the value that bought in the bush brought their organization, and likewise, the value that they brought us.
Oli Le Lievre 28:52
Wow. Well, I hope you can hear the excitement that I've got from having the chance to sit down with grace and chat in a bit of a different way, where we've covered not just the bar from the bush story in a little bit of detail. But also Grace has influenced how her and Jack have approached the farming business, but also what the learnings have been for that. Now, the purpose of these episodes is for us to go behind the scenes to understand what does it take to run better businesses? And what are the learnings from people who have been there before? How do they communicate? How do they build processes, just finding out more about them. So join us next week, part two, with Grace Brennan, we're looking to go behind the scenes and find out a little bit more about actually what goes on day to day, how do they make decisions? How does Grace approach asking questions? What have been some of the learnings that she's taken along the way? And I think a really interesting part that we dive into is, overall today, how much of it is the things that she absolutely loves and adores in the business, versus the things that actually just need to get done to keep the wheels ticking over? So join us next week for part two. This series is supported by the Farm Bill This Resilience Program through the Australian Government's future drought Fund, and the New South Wales Department of Primary Industries. And our aim is to sit down and chat with various people who have lived experience in business management through their stories. It's our aim to share their learnings, their approaches, and how they've supported developing themselves, their businesses and their teams.
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