On the phone from her new home in Bangkok, she explains that the company now sells 150,000 products every month, across 3000 stores in Australia including major supermarkets Coles and Woolworths.
The range is also available in selected stores in South Africa, and her next goal is to get on shelves in the UK and Europe.
“That fear of having container loads of curry and no one wanting to buy it, and then now having 150,000 products sold every month, it is just phenomenal,” she says.
There are currently seven products in the range and Grasby says sales have grown 15% over the past 12 months.
“You get so caught up in it every day that you have to stop and say, holy cow! Getting the company built to where it is at has been one of the most challenging, and also one of the most rewarding things that I have ever done.”
To ensure smooth production, the couple relocated to Thailand late last year, and they live a short drive from the factory, which helps with recipe creation.
“I can drive out to my producers and we can test a new product straight away, we can get samples done, we can change a minute amount of cardamom powder all together, rather than sending samples back and forth.”
Outsourcing tasks has been key to the company’s growth, with Grasby explaining they prefer to hire freelance experts for different tasks, rather than doing everything themselves.
“We can’t afford to have a digital marketing manager full time that handles everything, but we can afford to outsource and have a company that can design our website and do some maintenance on it.
“The biggest thing I’ve learned is that you cannot do everything, and there are people that do things much better than you.”
One aspect Grasby has down to a fine art is being the face of the business, which comes naturally after being on Masterchef.
She says the most important thing is to get out and show how passionate she is about the products.
“In Australia I need to be out there talking to journalists, doing photo shoots to promote it.”
However, Grasby thinks it’s vital for business owners to have a strategy for how they want their business to be represented.
“Rather than going out there and blagging about everything you do, you have to sit down and go, what are my core brand values, what are my core company values and how is it that I can communicate that to the world?” she says.
In her spare time, Grasby confesses that she is always cooking.
“I never stop cooking. I am either testing products, or testing recipes for my cookbook. I like cooking; my days are filled with cooking or doing emails.”
She recently took the time to write a cookbook, Marion: Recipes and Stories from a Hungry Cook.
Of her own product range, one steals her heart.
“The Thai green curry is my absolute favourite. It is a dish I ate growing up and I love the fact that it tastes just like it did when I was growing up.”
Melinda is a business writer and editor and helps companies to bring their brand stories to life through her small business, Oliver Content. Melinda was previously the content manager for KPMG Australia, an editor of SmartCompany, and spent many years as a journalist.
