There are so many sliding doors moments in the Vodusek family story, it could easily be made into a movie. The opening scenes would begin in the hills behind Celje in Slovenia on May 1, 1957, during the celebrations of what was then Yugoslavia’s International Workers’ Day. Teen Marija Godler, aged 15, catches the eye of 17-year-old butcher Franc Vodusek. Sparks fly and he gives her a lift home on his motorbike. However, the path of love is obstructed when Franc, inspired by radio broadcasts he’d heard of the Melbourne Olympics the previous year, decides to flee the communist regime and head for a better life in Australia.
In October of that year, young Franc escapes across the border into Austria. Eventually, after being processed and cleared in a refugee camp, he proceeds to Germany to work in a coal mine where he befriends an Orthodox Serbian miner before he boards a ship to Australia in October 1959.
Arriving in Fremantle, he disembarks thinking he’ll gain work as a butcher, but as he’s about to be processed through immigration, he’s handed a letter advising him that his friend in the mine has organised work and accommodation in Melbourne’s Orthodox community. Franc gets back on the boat and finally arrives in Melbourne. There’s no one there to meet him, so he loads his suitcase onto the train for the migrant reception centre at Bonegilla in north-east Victoria. At the last minute, his Melbourne hosts turn up at the port, his worldly goods chuff off on the train to Wodonga, but Franc is welcomed to Melbourne. He eventually gets his suitcase back.
Franc soon gains work in construction, laying pipes for new housing estates, then in the boning room in a bacon factory in Dandenong, where he works his way up to foreman in 1961.
In July of that year, Franc packs his trusty steel and knives and heads for Yarrawonga on the Victorian side of the Murray River. He quickly settles into the community where he opens a general store and butcher’s shop and gains the moniker “Frankie Foodland”. Queue swelling music as in August, Franc is finally reunited with Marija, with whom he’s been corresponding ever since he left four years earlier. The couple marries in the Yarrawonga Catholic Church on September 30, 1961 and they enjoy 61 happy years until Franc passes away at the age of 83 in 2023.
“When Mum and Dad settled in Yarrawonga, there weren’t many foreigners in town — just them and two Greek families who ran a cafe and a fruit and vegetable shop,” their younger son, Daimien, takes up the story line. “But Dad was a community man and they threw themselves into everything.” Franc went on to run butcher shops and abattoirs in Yarrawonga and nearby Cobram. Local health, schools, churches, sporting clubs and events was recognised in 2002 when he was awarded an Order of Australia Medal for community service.
As the Voduseks raised their family and became more entrenched in the north-east, they bought two farms on the Murray during the early 1980s. One was called Glen Loth and the other Rich Field, so they amalgamated the 1100-acre (480-hectare) holding and called it Rich Glen. Although they initially ran cattle, they recognised that such prime land on the river needed more intensive farming, so gradually planted a 350-acre (140ha) olive grove, mainly to Spanish and Italian olive oil varieties.
At this stage, the value of premium-quality extra-virgin olive oil was not as broadly appreciated as it is today and the Voduseks had little but the courage of their convictions and European heritage to convince them that olives had a future.
The second part of this sweeping family saga began when Daimien met Ros, who came from a local farming family. She’d begun a chef’s apprenticeship at 15 and by 18 and a half was appointed head chef. She was running a florist and cafe in Cobram when Daimien started coming in. “His parents were away on an overseas trip and he still lived at home, so the pretext for coming was that he couldn’t cook and he needed food,” Ros recalls. “I thought he was never going to ask me out, so I invited him to a wine-appreciation night.” When Ros and Daimien became engaged, they moved with Ros’s children, Hannah and Jack, into a homestead on Rich Glen.
By 2005, the bulk olive oil market was not doing well and Rich Glen olive oil was costing more to produce than they could get for it. “Franc pretty much decided to pull all the olive trees out,” Ros says. “I was pretty keen for that not to happen and Daimien and I persuaded him to let us have a go at value adding. I started making salad dressings and flavoured olive oils in the kitchen at home. We had an honesty box at the front of the property and we’d pretty much punch the air if we saw six people a day.”
Gradually the word spread, people liked what they tasted and the range grew. “We had this arrangement that Jack, who was about 10 or 11, got 10 per cent of sales,” Daimien says. “He was born entrepreneurial, so as soon as people turned up, he’d bolt out the door and serve them.” The Voduseks also expanded their lines to include skincare products and cosmetics that rely on the power of their golden oil.
People loved visiting the farm and the pet animals they met during visits, so in 2013, the Voduseks took another bold step, moved out of the house and turned it into a cafe. “It was nothing fancy, just one cake — a passionfruit sponge — and a coffee machine,” Ros says. “But the locals supported us and it just took off. A lot of our work was educating people about the many ways you could use olive oil and teaching them to appreciate the flavours it could provide.”
By 2019, the homestead cafe had grown beyond their wildest imaginings and the Voduseks welcomed 90,000 visitors. Shortly after, the world came to a standstill, and the beginning of COVID lockdowns could have been the death knell for the business. But the Vodusek family is nothing if not resilient, so they did what all good business people did at the time and pirouetted into online sales.
“We were aided by the ‘Click for Vic’ campaign,” says Jack, who is now the business’s CEO. “We produced care packs and hampers for people to send to staff and family during the lockdowns.”
They say fortune favours the bold, and the Voduseks took another leap in 2020, at the height of COVID, when they opened two stores in Yarrawonga.
“Once again, the locals backed us to the hilt, and it was so successful that we opened a shop devoted to beauty products up the road,” Damien says. “All those years Dad spent supporting the community have come back to reward us, as people seem genuinely proud to bring their family and friends to a genuine local business. We opened stores in Echuca in 2023 and in Bright in 2024.”
These days, Daimien and Ros are happy to call Jack “the boss”. Daimien remains head of finance and farm management, Ros is creative director and in charge of product development, daughter Hannah is head of skincare and training, while her 18-year-old sister Ava has her own skincare range, is in charge of social media and works in the beauty store. Their 16-year-old brother Max is still at school, but is a budding amateur parfumier and will doubtless find his own niche in the family business.
“Family comes first,” Damien says, as they all gather for a rare break in their hectic schedules and a celebratory lunch in the olive grove. “It works because we all care deeply about each other and the business. Adaptability is your biggest asset in business these days and I think we’ve shown we have that. We also stay in our lanes and let the individuals look after their areas of expertise.”
As the end credits roll on this multi-generational story, the Voduseks gather round for a bonfire and barbecue on the banks of the Murray. The grandchildren, Jack and his wife Mel’s baby, Pia Rose, and Hannah’s son, Charlie, join the relaxed and happy gathering.
“Hopefully there will be roles for them if they want to join the business in the future,” Daimien says. “We have much to thank our parents for making all this possible. We’re lucky to live and work in this great part of the country.” AC
