Creating and manufacturing Australian made commercial kitchen equipment is something that Luus takes enormous pride in. With our factory and head office based in Sunshine in Melbourne’s West, the local community and people we employ are at the heart of everything we do. In keeping with this is the relationship Luus have established with charity-based organization, The Big Umbrella.
10 years ago, Justin Dickinson founded The Big Umbrella (TBU) with a huge amount of passion and energy and a clear desire to help address food insecurity and the food waste he witnessed growing in Melbourne and surrounds. Today TBU has rescued over 440 tonnes of food to make over 260,000 freshly prepared nutritious meals to offer to marginalised and often ignored people in the community with support from over 35,000 volunteers.
“Here at The Big Umbrella, we firmly believe in synchronicity and trust that good people doing good things will manage to find each other when the timing is right. Nothing is truer than when TBU founder, Justin Dickinson walked into the Luus showroom unannounced and met account manager William, who immediately got what TBU was all about. TBU had received generous funding from a group of corporate partners and supporters to build a food truck to provide food relief and use the vehicle to fundraise selling burgers and fries at large events such as music festivals and football matches. William knew that Luus wanted to help, and without any coercion or persuasion, he connected Justin with Luus CEO Ao. That was the beginning of what is and will continue to be a very close friendship and partnership between Ao, William and Justin.“
“Luus provided a 6 burner stove and double deep dryer for the food truck in time for it to be dispatched to north East Victoria during the devastating 2020 fires. Justin and the volunteers provided much needed smiles and delicious burgers and food to people affected by the fires and front-line workers. The truck returned to Melbourne to service the meal program at Federation Square and attend some football matches and the Elton John concert raising funds for the charity. “
“The close and incredibly supportive friendship was recently reaffirmed when TBU signed the lease for a large factory site in Brunswick and embarked on building a 100 square meter commercial kitchen from scratch. Luus jumped in again and supplied for free another 6 burner stove, 3 basket deep fryer and a bratt pan. Luus also heavily discounted a hugely powerful and impressive Zanussi 20 tray combi oven. The quality of the meals prepared have gone to the next level and the friends that line up for a warm meal have certainly commented. “
“With friends like Luus, The Big Umbrella Foundation can confidently take on more and respond to the ever growing need to provide food relief to those in need throughout Victoria and to address the enormous amount of food waste generated by the food industry.”
Luus Industries continues to support The Big Umbrella in their future ventures, highlighting one of our main company values that ‘people matter most’. We invite other charity organisations and groups to get in touch with our team if they would like our support. We are always looking for great opportunities, and evaluate our partnerships on an annual basis.
Wishing all the best for The Big Umbrella in the future and we can’t wait to see what’s next for our relationship with this amazing company.
