Episode #14

Krista & Rob Watkins – Natural Evolution

Krista and Rob Watkins step-changed their business from banana growing in Walkamin Queensland, to starting the world’s first pharmaceutical grade banana flour factory and launching Natural Evolution, a range of natural, nutritious, gluten-free superfoods.

As second generation farmers, Krista & Rob wanted to diversify and de-risk their business.

Like many primary producers their annual crop return was at the mercy of mother nature, boom and bust cycles of supply, with more than 20% of their green bananas wasted annually when they didn’t meet strict supermarket buying standards.

In this episode, you’ll hear how one day Rob had an ‘eureka’ moment of discovery when driving over a bunch of dried bananas with a forklift and saw a ‘puff of banana dust’ – this discovery transformed their business from a banana farm into the world’s first commercial banana flour factory. The combination of Rob’s engineering ingenuity and Krista’s baking experimentation, led this couple to develop a whole range of natural, nutritious, gluten-free superfoods under the brand of Natural Evolution – based on the amazing properties of green banana flour, which they discovered is the richest source of resistant starch in the world.

Plus, in this episode, you’ll learn how to create more ‘eureka’ moments of inspiration for your business to help you generate new product ideas.

Learn more about Natural Evolution products, and connect with Krista and Rob on:

https://www.naturalevolutionfoods.com.au

https://www.facebook.com/GlutenFreeResistanceStarchBananaFlour

https://www.instagram.com/naturalevolution/

Many thanks to our long-term sponsor, the Monash Food Innovation Centre in Melbourne, Australia. Find out how they can help your business become more innovative: https://www.foodinnovationcentre.com.au