We love learning the history behind where a new product has come from and how that company grew and came to be, and the family story of Forager Foods is a good one!

The Forager Food Co. is steeped in a rich family heritage of farming and food production dating back generations. The Ranicar family has lived in Tasmania since the 1950’s when Edward and Betty Ranicar left tea plantation management in India, seeking the best farming ground, and a good temperate climate. Their son Piers and his wife Susie developed the berry fruit and salmon industries in Tasmania, now some of the largest agricultural industries in the state.

Susie’s great great grandfather was Thomas Mort, inventor of the first refrigerated shipping service between Europe and Australia along with the corporatisation of the dairy industry in Australia in the mid to late 1800’s. His legacy lives on through the modern day company Elders Ltd.

The Campbell family settled in Tasmania in 1853, when Lachlan Mackinnon Campbell left Scotland to establish the colony’s first Presbyterian church and later build a farming empire that some 6 generations later, continues in Tasmania. Roaming the highlands of Tasmania wasn’t such a different environment to Scotland!

The story continues today...

John and Sophie Ranicar are the descendants of these well know Tasmanian families and continue the legacy through The Forager Food Co., which they established in 2009 to utilise and preserve the best local produce in it’s purest form – freeze dried.

On their family property in Northern Tasmania, John and Sophie have built a world class freeze drying facility with state of the art equipment. They process, dry and package a diverse range of foods providing long shelf life whilst protecting the most valuable and delicate ingredients including vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, colours and flavours.

Known as the ‘delicatessen to the world’, Tasmania has a smart and progressive agricultural industry that is based on sound ecological principals including legislating against the use of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO’s). John and Sophie have built their business around these positive attributes and hope to emulate their forbearers with a sound business that lasts generations.