What children eat impacts their development, and while kids have a penchant for sweets, they need healthy, nutritious snacks.
Beyond access to healthy snacks, parents need to know what their kids are eating and what is in the food they eat.
Koala Picks makes healthy children’s snacks that use no refined sugar, artificial flavours, colours or preservatives and are free of trans-fats and oil. They’ve partnered with a nutritionist to make sure the food products they sell are the right portions and are in line with a healthy nutritional profile.
When did you come up with the idea of Koala Picks or realise there was a gap in the market for the business?
The idea of Koala Picks came up almost two years ago when our eldest son who was four at the time started to ask for unhealthy snacks such as cookies, candy, muffins, etc.
As parents, we are very conscious with what our kids eat and we felt that there weren’t enough healthy snack options in the market. We decided to take matters into our own hands and build a brand that offers healthy snacks for kids and parents.
Our promise to our customers is no refined sugar, no preservatives and no artificial ingredients, only natural ones.
Aya Assaf and Ahmed Mobasher, Co-Founders of Koala Picks
What is your business plan?
We started off as an e-commerce business through selling only through our website, however we started branching out and reaching out to different retailers to grow our product distribution. Besides our website, we are now available across 8 different play areas across the Emirates. We are also available in four supermarkets in Abu Dhabi and other online grocery apps.
Is the company bootstrapped or have you raised capital from investors? Can you take us through your funding journey?
Yes it was bootstrapped until recently. Now we are going through our first round of external fundraising from family and friends to scale up the business.
Tell me about your expansion plans?
We operated from a small shop in JLT over the past year and a half. To scale up operations and automate a lot of the manual work our team has to do, we decided to move to a bigger facility in Dubai Investment Park. We will start production from the new facility in July.
Where would you like to see the company in the next five years?
We would like to expand our operations in the UAE first and then move to adjacent markets in the GCC and North Africa region.
What advice would you give anyone looking to start their own business in the region?
There are many factors that contribute to the success of the business. The first one is to make sure that there is a significant need for the business, Also once started it takes a lot of resilience, persistence and effort so giving up shouldn’t be an option especially during the first two to three years. But some advice for anyone looking to start a business is to surround yourself with positive and optimistic people that will help make your dream a reality. Otherwise, you will doubt yourself, your idea and could end up not taking any steps forward.
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