50 stories - Dimitar Kovatchev
25 July 2022 Events and Discussions
Melbourne
Food Products Supplier
I was born in Sofia, Bulgaria and first arrived in Australia in 1991.
As an adventurous young man in my twenties, I was travelling the world when I visited Sydney for a ten-day holiday.
As I enjoyed the city very much, I decided to stay for a while and, as I like to say, to play my cards.
My next destination was Melbourne and this place became home for me from then on. Sometimes I joke around by saying that I had come to Australia for a holiday and now 26 years later, I still am on a holiday.
I passed the benchmark of the Australian point system for migration and in 1995 became a citizen of the best country in the entire world! After working at a five star venue, known as the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, for quite some time, my passion for food operations evolved.
In 1998 I decided to start my very own business and began importing and wholesaling in Australia food products from Bulgaria and Europe. After more than 20 years in the food industry, I now supply chains of supermarkets and various food service industries across all Australia with local and imported food products, as well as with raw materials.
The story is from the book “Bulgarians in Melbourne” (2017) from Radost Racheva, who is also author of the photographs, provided pro bono for the project.