Watch The Brookfarm Story: An Australian made story that starts in the rainforest on the family farm

It starts on the family farm...

Learn about the Brookfarm story - where regenerating a rainforest on the family farm inspired award winning macadamia muesli, and a genuine care for the environment in everything we do. Watch the full story below.

A run down cattle farm

In 1988, Pam and Martin Brook bought a run down cattle farm, sight unseen, in the hinterland of Byron Bay, Australia. When they arrived, they found an absolute barren hillside, full of bare compacted dirt, weeds and camphor laurels, a destructive tree that aggressively replaces native vegetation.​​​​​​​​

While hacking their way through metre high lantana and weeds, they found right on the eastern border, a tiny remnant. Just a few trees. A small piece of the Big Scrub, which was once Australia's largest subtropical rainforest.

30 Years On

30 years on Brookfarm is thriving story of rainforest regeneration, focusing on native trees and plants, and commercial farming practises working together as a biodiverse ecosystem.​​​​​​​​

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The tiniest patch of rainforest left in the wasteland, that kicked off this whole journey, has been hand planted into a self sufficient mature tree and wildlife corridor running through the farm.​​​​​​​​ 

Now it is a restored ancient sub tropical rainforest, home to over 45,000 native trees & 4,000 macadamia trees and a haven for wildlife, birds and insects once again. 

​​​​​​​As generational Australian family business, we are committed to regenerative agriculture & Australian farmers, passionate about real food, community & the environment. 

Our award winning breakfasts & snacks use all-natural premium Australian ingredients, and world first home recyclable packaging.  Committed to sourcing Australian ingredients that are preservative and additive free, catering to all diets including gluten free, grain free, vegan and keto.

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Video Transcript

Martin Brook - Co-Founder of Brookfarm: I remember when we first saw the land, you know, and when you look around now, believe me, it was… totally different. We’re talking about a land that was severely eroded. We’re talking about a complete sad mess.

And then of course, one of the real excitements was hacking our way through this metre high lantana and weeds and then finding - right on the eastern border - this remnant. These few trees. From this great subtropical rainforest that used to be here.

Will Brook - CEO of Brookfarm: How do we act as custodians for this land, rather than just… pulling the nutrients out of it, and squeezing it for whatever it’s got - just so we can get a crop out. I think that’s what really drives us, at Brookfarm, is what’s the best thing and what’s the right thing that we can do. 

And because we regenerated that rainforest, we ended up stopping the baiting. And our rat damage went down, because we were no longer poisoning, inadvertently, owls, and snakes, and things like that. What we created was an environment for those predator species to thrive in. 

Taking a holistic approach to the farm ended up having a better result for our yields, and for the farm itself, and for the bottom line.

Martin Brook: We have responsibilities not only as manufacturers, but as people who live on this planet to do all we can to be able to create products, and produce products that are environmentally sustainable.

Will Brook: Brookfarm itself, the business, the products that you see - they’re really born and influenced by the macadamia. We do that with mueslis, with granolas, with snack mixes. We genuinely care about the quality of all the ingredients, and the way that we bake all of those things.

We’ve got solar panels that completely cover our packing facility, because we really care about our impact on the environment. And we want every single product that we make and all the packaging, and everything like that to be completely recyclable. 

Having a business that’s really been driven by an ethnic and by values, that as a family we share, means that we can take much more of a long-term view about what our impact is, but also a long term view of business as a whole and how it runs.

Pam Brook - Head of Innovations/Co-Founder of Brookfarm: So that means that you’ve got the freedom to say, if we going to make a product, I’m going to find ingredients that taste the best. That make a difference to farmers where we buy from.

We are going to make products that are really healthy. But it’s not enough to have a healthy product, it has to taste delicious. 

Will Brook: It really started by creating the best possible muesli that you can make. That wasn’t represented anywhere else. We ate really great muesli in our home because we made it ourselves.

Pam Brook: Each day I would bake and bake and trial this oil level, this many nuts, this many seeds. And then every day the guys would get a different one to taste and experiment on.

Will Brook: We ate so much muesli. Like, we’ll probably done with muesli for a while. 

Pam Brook: And every day they would come home and go, “Oh no mum, not again!”

Will Brook: Now that I look back on that now - that was product development. That was product development that happened in the family kitchen. And it still happens in the family kitchen today.

Pam Brook: Thousands of people all around Australia, and in the world today are eating our products and I hope that there’s a family that’s enjoying those, while they’re eating them together. That’s always been what we’ve been about creating.

Will Brook: If you work at Brookfarm - you expect to be working somewhere that’s acting in a sustainable way and leading the industry.

My hopes for Brookfarm is that we can grow to be able to share our message about what we do. And we’ve got all these little proven models on our farm that we can then tell other people about, so that they can do the same thing.

You know, regenerating a rainforest doesn’t take a lifetime. You can do this within half a generation.

Martin Brook: I actually love taking my grandkids around the rainforest.

Will Brook: I remember when I was their age, how special that was for me. But to be able to have mum and dad, now as grandparents, to be leading my kids through the farm and through the rainforest.

There’s some sort of special little message there about the pride that you have in what you do.