Dick Smith Foods

Dick Smith Foods is a food brand created by Australian entrepreneur Dick Smith to provide Australian owned and produced alternatives to products from foreign-owned food companies.[1]

It was formed in 1999 largely in response to the high market share of those companies, and the increasingly frequent take-over of previously Australian-owned companies, including Arnott's and Pauls. In particular, Smith was concerned that many companies which were no longer Australian owned still marketed their products as "Australian": the iconic Australian breakfast spread Vegemite, for example, was owned by Kraft Foods (now known as Mondelēz), which in turn was (until 2007) owned by the Altria Group (formerly known as tobacco giant Philip Morris).[2]

On 26 July 2018, Dick Smith announced the business would close in 2019 due to competition with German supermarket Aldi and to avoid bankruptcy.[3]

Licensing arrangements and business

Dick Smith Foods does not manufacture its own food products. Instead, it sources products from other Australian-owned companies, which licence the Dick Smith Foods brand label.

In 2004, Smith announced his intention to make Dick Smith Foods a commercial operation, and to list it on the stock market by 2009.[4] In the same year, 2004, Smith offered to purchase Vegemite from Kraft, but was unsuccessful.[5]

In 2006, the Herald Sun newspaper reported that Dick Smith Foods turnover had halved, due in part to the difficulty of finding local suppliers for their products.[6] [7]

In 2011, Smith announced that he would be taking control of the management of the company again, after turnover dropped from $80 million to $8 million over the previous five years. He implemented a vision for the return to Australian-owned, Australian-grown produce where all the profits stay in Australia, instead of heading offshore as they do with the majority of foreign-owned food suppliers. The company had previously been managed, and some of its products produced under licence, by the Sanitarium Health and Wellbeing Company, which pays Dick Smith Foods for the rights to the company's branding.

Generally, the brand focuses on producing local alternatives to products with large market shares like Kraft peanut butter and Vegemite. DSF donates a portion of its profits to charitable causes.[8]

Legal issues

Dick Smith Foods ran into legal difficulties in 2003, when Arnott's Biscuits Holdings took the company to court. The issue was a trademark dispute over DSF's Temptin' brand of chocolate biscuits, which Arnott's alleged had diluted their trademark as a similar biscuit (the Tim Tam), in similarly-designed packaging.[9] The case was settled out of court, and Smith responded by casting Greg Arnott, a member of the Arnott family, in a commercial for Temptins.[10]

References

  1. ^ AAP (27 July 2001), "Dick sticks with peanut butter", Herald Sun, p. 41
  2. ^ Lewis, Peter: Dick Smith's tasty new adventure Archived copy, Landline (Australian Broadcasting Corporation), 23 April 2000.
  3. ^ O'Malley, Nick (26 July 2018). "Dick Smith to close his grocery line, blaming unbeatable Aldi". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 27 July 2018.
  4. ^ Webb, Richard (7 November 2004), "Dick Smith Foods to change aim", The Sunday Age, p. 10
  5. ^ Media Release: Dick Smith offers to buy Vegemite to help out a battling Kraft Archived 29 August 2007 at the Wayback Machine, Dick Smith Foods, 27 October 2004.
  6. ^ Walker, Frank (5 February 2006), "Vegemite could go Chinese: Dick Smith", Herald Sun, p. 28, archived from the original on 24 March 2012
  7. ^ Cherry, Brenton (11 March 2011), "EXCLUSIVE: Aussie entrepreneur Dick Smith brings business and jobs to the beaches", Manly Daily
  8. ^ Pedersen, Daniel (15 June 2018). "Dick Smith's million-dollar gift for the Country Women's Association". The Courier. Retrieved 27 July 2018., a $1 million donation
  9. ^ Went, Sheree: Smith and fans tempt Tim Tams, The Age, 7 May 2003.
  10. ^ An Arnott is latest weapon for cheeky Dick Archived 26 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine, B&T, 26 September 2003.

External links


This page was last updated at 2019-11-10 13:55 UTC. Update now. View original page.

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