Australian entrepreneur Dick Smith is celebrating the turnover of his latest company, Dick Smith Foods, which has exceeded forecasts tenfold to reach A$100m (US$50.9m) in its first sixteen months. Smith founded the company in response to what he sees as foreign-owned domination of the food manufacturing sector, epitomised by the foreign acquisition of perennial Aussie favourite Vegemite.
He used the opportunity presented by the release of these strong 16-month results to urge other aspiring businessmen and women to choose Australian, and stressed his opinion that ‘Australian-made’ is not the same as ‘Australian-owned’. “Australian made mostly results in all the profits going overseas, whereas Australian owned means that the profits stay here,” said Smith, who praised Australian consumers for their support for home-grown companies like Dick Smith Foods.
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Meanwhile, just-food.com last month published a feature suggesting that much of Dick Smith’s success has come at the expense of other small Australian companies, rather than large multinationals. Has his strategy backfired? Read the feature here.
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