MEET YOUR {OUTSTANDING} MAKER -WISE BOYS
“For people like us who don’t come from a culinary background, we’ve put so much effort in, and to be recognised for this is amazing. We’re stoked that people enjoy what we’ve created.”
Purveyors of delicious vegan food, Wise Boys are more than just that – the pair are also brothers. Their kaupapa was rewarded recently with two Gold Medals at the 2023 Outstanding NZ Food Producer Awards, for Wise Boys Hemp and Mushroom Burger Patties and Wise Boys Spicy Chipotle Burger Patties. They also collected a Silver and two Bronze medals for their dressings to add to a Gold and Silver Medal from the 2022 Outstanding New Zealand Food Producer Awards
When brothers Luke and Tim Burrows switched to a plant-based diet seven years ago, the simple task of getting takeaways or eating out at restaurants with friends became a uninspiring and challenging task.
Frustrated at the lack of plant options, the duo decided to take matters into their own hands and founded Wise Boys, a plant-based burger company that now also produces a range of vegan dressings, sauces and meat alternatives, which are available at supermarkets across the country.
Tim and Luke had grown up eating meat and converted to a plant-based diet later in life, so they wanted to create foods that were appealing to plant-based eaters, as well as keen meat eaters. “We wanted to create something hearty and appealing, I wanted to make vegan food more accessible so it didn’t seem like some niche thing,” explains Luke. “I just wanted to make good sustainable food that appealed to everyone - not just vegans.”
Connected by their shared perspective and a few secondhand tools, Luke and Tim set forth, leaving behind their corporate jobs as a lawyer and engineer. “We left the corporate thing behind and decided to build a food truck ourselves in our parents’ driveway,” says Luke. “We did it all ourselves out of recycled materials on the cheap.”
A few months later, with their truck completed they began selling tasty vegan burgers across Auckland and at festivals and events across the North Island. As the concept grew in popularity, solidifying what the pair believed in, the brothers launched a crowd funding campaign to revamp the truck and take things a bit further. After raising a decent amount of money from the local community, the brothers began fitting out their truck with bigger equipment and supplies.
“A lot of people were pretty excited, it was one of the first vegan food trucks in New Zealand, and a lot of people wanted to get behind us,” says Luke. The pair decided to keep the momentum going, and opened their first Wise Boys restaurant four years ago. “We opened in Grey Lynn in 2019, revitalising an old run down takeaway shop, and were immediately welcomed by the local community,” explains Luke.
A few months later, the brothers were approached to open up a second location at the famed Commercial Bay - one of the main food and bar hubs in central Auckland. “They wanted to get us in, so we opened our second Wise Boys in early 2020, meaning we did two openings in a year,” says Luke.
In 2020 the brothers branched out and launched their products into supermarkets, including plant-based aioli, mayonnaise, salad dressing and vegan burger patties.
Sustainability is a key element of their business, and they incorporate sustainable practice into their restaurants and their food products. “It’s a bit of a cliche word now, but when we started we called ourselves ‘Zero Waste Enterprises’,” he says.
Although the philosophy of veganism is often rooted in animal welfare and the reduction of carbon emissions, Luke says that isn’t the end of their personal philosophy. Instead, it’s about ethnical consumption in general, no matter peoples’ personal decisions. “Zero waste has been a big thing for us, we use glass for our products instead of plastic, we focus on recycling and zero landfill operation is the goal, and we work as hard as we can to install that in our stores” says Luke.
Alongside this, having a positive workplace is key. “We want to create a workplace where people enjoy working. Our staff are on board with the vision of working somewhere that is committed to positive outcomes, and as a result we have low staff turnover and that transfers to quality of product and hopefully the customer experience”.
Winning at the Outstanding New Zealand Food Producer Awards was an incredible experience. “For people like us who don’t come from a culinary background, we’ve put so much effort in, and to be recognised for this is amazing. We’re stoked that people enjoy what we’ve created,” he says. “We’re trying to make vegan food appealing and tasty, and results like this help confirm we’re headed in the right direction”.
LEARN MORE ABOUT WISE BOYS BY VISITING THEIR WEBSITE.