Each week thousands of companies around Australia purchase fresh fruit boxes for their staff. These fresh fruit boxes are largely undifferentiated in terms of quality, purpose or cause. Our team sees the unique opportunity to create a differentiated and purposeful option for businesses. With every box purchased, fruitpactful helps create employment opportunities for young people to live, work and thrive in their city.
fruitpactful exists to make a difference to young people who face a range of barriers and disadvantage. The initiative provides young people with fair-wage employment, on-the-job mentoring and a supported financial pathway to sustainable livelihoods.
With fruitpactful, there will be an Anglicare staff member who coordinates the enterprise with key tasks of securing contracts and subscriptions. Young people who are employed by fruitpactful will walk into work that’s already present - mitigating the fear of rejection.
Each employee will be provided with an opportunity to complete daily tasks, be part of a community and earn their own income. Mentors can join young people on fruit sourcing (buying or picking), packing and delivery trips. These interactions can include working with them on mental health strategies as well as building transferable skill sets they can take away for life.
Young people also are not required to have high literacy to complete these entry-level tasks. Skills required will be foundational and provide a low barrier to entry. However, further programs can be created to upskill their current skill set, from managerial (project management) to tech-based (inventory and order coordination) curriculums.
fruitpactful’s model creates flexibility, in that the purchasing and packing of fruit can be completed at various times during the day. If stored correctly, boxes can be packed in advance. This also creates flexibility in staffing, especially if the number of young people arriving at work fluctuates from day to day.
As a business, fruitpactful can work at various scales. Testing the concept can involve one to two businesses, with a small team of young people. This can also easily grow to serve dozens of small to large businesses and organisations in the Perth Metro area.
Currently, what these young people do not have is that ‘leg up in life’. We want our young people to thrive in all parts of their lives. fruitpactful gives them that very leg up that equates to a renewed sense of confidence. It’s with this confidence and purpose that these young people can begin on a path to realising their true potential - and perhaps be our leaders of tomorrow.
