How three uni classmates turned an assignment about a common problem into a booming business that has a deal with Dan Murphy’s

Three bright young Aussie students have proven their business acumen by not only getting selected for an exclusive university course, but for then turning that opportunity into a successful start-up business thanks to a genius idea. 

Budding entrepreneurs Gabriel Tucker, Max Moolman and Bridget Lansell were among the 30 people chosen from 500 applicants for the Fastrack Accelerator program at Monash University in Melbourne.

They had never met before day one of the course, but hit it off and decided to work together on an assignment with the broad task of finding a solution to an economic problem of their choice. 

Though it took them quite a while to come up with the right problem to tackle, they settled on food waste, which costs the Australian economy around $36.6billion per year.

Mr Moolman was astonished at how much food goes to waste, despite Australia’s ‘amazing produce’.

On further investigation, the trio found that about a quarter of all produce doesn’t leave the farms it’s grown on, even though it’s perfectly edible, simply because it looks a little ‘wonky’.

They thought it was the most ridiculous thing they had ever heard and resolved to do something about it. 

When Mr Tucker saw how a lawn bowling club was using beer profits to save other bowlos from closing, the idea to make alcoholic drinks that used farm produce that would have otherwise have been thrown out came to them – and Wonki was born.

‘We started diving into the market in Australia, and we just could not find a single alcoholic product that was using imperfect or misshapen fruit,’ Mr Moolman told Yahoo.

They thought that was crazy, given that juice, jam and various other every day products were made from fruit that would be considered second or third grade.

The students came up with the brand name Wonki, but it was going to take a lot more than just some clever wordplay to make their enterprise a success, especially with some many long-established businesses to compete with. 

So they went around Melbourne people for their views on pre-mixed drinks – questions such as are they existing products too sugary and what flavours they would like to see.

Having found what they wanted to launch with, they got a company called Farmers Pick to find the produce, Market Juice for juicing and Gypsy Hub to make the drinks.

They raised $30,000 through crowdfunding initiative and used that to make their first batch of Wonki vodka soda drinks.

Then they wore down their shoe leather by going into bars and bottle shops to ask them to stock their brand.   

It worked, and within a few months, even the liquor giant Dan Murphy’s was stocking Wonki. 

This was all the more impressive considering Dan Murphy’s gets around 400 applications a year from companies looking to get a foot in the door for their pre-mix drinks.

Wonki is now stocked in 33 Dan Murphy’s stores across Victoria, 35 BWS locations and 30 independent stores.

Bridget Lansell, one of the creators of Wonki, is pictured advertising the brand

The trio’s genius idea was to use fruit that would otherwise be wasted because it was misshapen to make alcohol

With warmer weather and citrus fruits on the way, they’re about to rerelease their Blood Orange and Mandarin flavour (pictured)

The trajectory of the trio’s success has been impressive. They met at the end of 2021, spent 2022 working on their idea, launched it in mid-2023 and had a Dan Murphy’s contract Christmas that year. 

Their company’s sales were $205,000 in the 2023-2024 financial year and they are confident that will keep rising and they will save more and more of the 7.6million tonnes of food that gets thrown out each year in Australia – 70 per cent of which is fine, but doesn’t get to supermarket shelves as it’s considered misshapen.

‘Every case saves about two and a half to three kilos of produce, but we’ve just clocked over 10 tonnes of produce saved from farms since the middle of last year,’ Mr Moolman said.

‘We reckon we can save a hell of a lot more. The ultimate goal is to be able to eliminate an entire farm’s second or third-grade waste every season.’

Another near term goal for the trio, who are aged from 23 to 25, is to expand out of Victoria across the country and to also find farmers in other states whose produce they can make drinks with.

As fruit is a seasonal produce, the two Wonki flavours currently on sale are Watermelon and Lemon, and Cucumber and Lime.

With warmer weather and citrus fruits on the way, they’re about to rerelease their Blood Orange and Mandarin flavour.