Spudbar was founded in Melbourne in 2000, born out of inspiration by the lack of healthy, beautiful tasting food that was quick, convenient and value for money. Our founder, Clay Thompson and his wife Laura longed for a food outlet that provided nutritious, inexpensive fast food. When nothing could be found the only option available was to create a food concept themselves. Hence the idea for Spudbar!
Over the years in numerous hospitality roles Clay gained an understanding of how simple & fresh ingredients can be used to create beautiful food that is healthy, tasty and inexpensive.
Spudbar was created to be a really honest approach to food - what you see is what you get. All the gorgeous flavors were carefully selected for the way they work with each other as well as their nutritional quality. No more old fashioned baked spuds with coleslaw and sour cream – the humble spud is gone and in its place the spud masterpiece is born. Clay loves educating customers and franchisees alike about the ethos of Spudbar "Healthy People, Healthy World" as it is an extension of his personal beliefs.
Clay opened the first store in Blessington St, St Kilda in 2000. It is still a favorite hangout for local residents. The first franchise store was opened in 2004 and we now have stores in Victoria, New Zealand and Western Australia. Over time, the product range has evolved to include salads and seasonal soups - always using fresh and healthy vegetables as the foundation of everything we do.
Kirsten Roberts joined the business as CEO in 2007 to facilitate the growth of Spudbar as it takes on Australia and the rest of the world! (Remember the old ad, she loved the product so much she bought part of the company.) As a businesswoman and mother of 2 young children, Kirsten is wrapped to be leading the team that is introducing healthy tasty meals to people young and old. From her experience, Kirsten knows first hand how tough it is to find fast meals that the whole family loves to eat, yet is still nutritious.
Kirsten’s experience in sales and marketing, and business consulting has helped take the business from a small franchise with a strong brand to a growing franchise capable of taking on the big boys. And she is a walking advertisement for the product "I love that I can eat Spudbar three times a week, and I can have completely different flavours each time. However my absolutely fave is a Poco Stallion with extra jalapneos".
Co-owner Simon McNamara, former CEO of Boost Juice and a founding shareholder of Grill’d joined the business in 2009. A guru in the fast casual food market, Kirsten and Clay are ecstatic to have his experience when setting the direction for the business. Simon is a true entrepreneur in the food arena. Simon founded Viva Juice and built it up to 23 stores before it was bought out by Boost Juice. Simon then rose to CEO of Boost Juice where he guided the business through its fastest growth phase from 70 stores to 160 stores. A love for healthy retail businesses was further established as a founding shareholder of Grill’d. Simon has now extended that passion to Spudbar to help drive the business to achieve its potential....and he’s loving the food "I have been trying many different Spudbar meals since I joined the business and am amazed about how excited I get about different flavours on spuds. But I am a meat man and my favourite is definitely the bolognaise topped with bacon".
But the heart of our business is our customers. We want our customers to have a great time in store and to love the flavours and freshness of our products. With over 50% of customers eating at Spudbar at least once a week, and 80% of customers eating at Spudbar at least once a month, we think we are doing pretty good job in delivering what our customers are after.
