LISA KING
Working in marketing for some of the biggest household food brands in the world, Lisa King (40), was, by her own admission, being paid to sell junk food to the masses. Fifteen years in, and no longer able to ignore the disconnect between her personal values and her professional responsibilities, she decided enough was enough, and left the high-flying corporate arena to found Eat My Lunch, an innovative ‘buy one, give one’ food-delivery service that, for every lunch purchased, provides a healthy and nutritious lunch to a school kid in need. With 1600 lunches made and delivered daily to 48 schools in Auckland, Hamilton, and Wellington, the business has been able to feed over 450,000 Kiwi kids in two years… and with not a chippie packet in sight. Here, Lisa tells us how she made it happen.
How did you wind up working in the corporate food industry? I studied a Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Commerce at Auckland University, majoring in French, Spanish, and international business. I wanted to work for a big multinational with potential to be posted overseas. At the time, the New Zealand Dairy Board (now Fonterra) had a marketing graduate programme with an overseas market focus, so after graduating I spent three years working for them in the Philippines before moving to London and a role at Unilever. I returned home when I became pregnant with my daughter Ella, and I worked for other food manufacturers on and off, including Cadbury, Bluebird, and Heinz Wattie’s. What made you realise your job wasn’t for you? The fact that I wasn’t happy feeding my children the foods I was marketing. I was very much about a healthy and balanced diet at home, yet I was marketing salt, fat, and sugar to the public. At dinner parties, my friends and I would actually argue over which of us had the worst job — the lawyer, the one who worked for Coca-Cola, the one who worked for an alcohol company, or me! What made you ultimately
take the leap and leave? After thinking up the concept for Eat My Lunch, I entered it into a competition for women with a business idea. Out of 400 entries, it was selected as one of eight finalists. I didn’t win, but with the idea out there I realised if I didn’t do it, someone else would. I was also a couple of years out from turning 40, and given my dad had passed away at 50 I felt a real sense of urgency to do something that I — and my kids — would be proud of.
What’s a typical day for you now? My team starts making lunches at 5am. I start at 7:30am, bringing in Ella and my son Toby who have to make their own lunches. After dropping them off at school, my day continues — this means
meeting with our corporate partners and with the team, reviewing customer feedback, testing recipes, posting on our social media platforms, and every week or so I will do a speaking event. I try to use the evenings to look at our longer-term strategy, structure, and new opportunities. What made you gravitate towards your new profession? I’ve always done charity work even when I was working. Having a job that is both commercial and social is the dream. How
did your previous work prepare you for what you do now? Fifteen years working for large corporates equipped me with commercial acumen, experience in marketing, product development and strategy, and an understanding of customer needs. What retraining did you have to do? When you run your own business, there isn’t a lot of time for formalised learning, it’s more about trying things, making mistakes and adapting quickly. Identifying early on what we didn’t know, and surrounding ourselves with experts in those areas, was key. We brought on board Michael Meredith, for instance, whose cooking and recipe development skills have been central to the business. Is working for yourself
what you expected it to be? It’s the hardest job I’ve ever had — and I was doing some pretty big hours in my corporate life. It occupies your mind 24/7 and the to-do list is always endless. I also didn’t expect to be this attached to the business, but it’s not just work. It becomes your life and those in it (the team, the kids) are considerations in everything you do. What challenges do you face that didn’t factor in your old job? Fighting the day-to-day fires as well as trying to lift myself above the details and keep an eye looking towards the future. What are the different
rewards? The autonomy and ability to make decisions and know that you are creating your own destiny is a reward that is rarely found working for someone else. More than anything though, for every single minute and every ounce of energy that I put into Eat My Lunch, there is an outcome. We get to make a real difference to children’s lives and that’s not something I have felt doing previous jobs. How has the change of scenery in your professional life made way for
personal growth? Like many Kiwis, I was not aware of the extent of child poverty in New Zealand. Eat My Lunch has opened my eyes to the socio-economic spectrum, while the incredible generosity and support from our volunteers, our corporate supporters, and everyone who buys our lunches has restored my faith in humankind. What’s your
advice to anyone considering a drastic career change? It takes a lot of courage to change careers, especially later in life, but given that we spend so much of our lives working, you might as well do something you love.
#