A Gold Coast business has showed its propensity for growth by expanding into a third factory, ramping up production output, and further investing in additional staff and equipment.

Plant Doctor’s second Gold Coast-based facility will focus solely on food manufacturing, a component of the business that has gained significant momentum due to contract food packaging and the demand for smaller production runs.  

Now operating out of two units in Expo Court Ashmore, the company has brought six new jobs to the area and increased its manufacturing capabilities by 35 per cent.  

Plant Doctor Managing Director Adam Fitzhenry says after introducing the company’s food manufacturing arm the increase in orders has been steady.

“We are a family owned and operated business manufacturing liquid and granular fertilisers, as well as dried food products into bags, jars and capsules,” says Mr Fitzhenry.

“Our operational set up enables small businesses and start-ups the opportunity to produce smaller minimum production runs, which helps with their cashflow, as they are not required to outlay a huge expense to meet the larger companies’ minimum production runs.

“Despite the fact that we’re catering to a niche market, the number of contracts we’ve received has meant that we’ve had to expand and increase our operational capacity.” 

Plant Doctor now employs over 15 full-time and casual staff and has introduced permanent evening shifts to manage the workload.

“At times, we’ve had to implement temporary overnight shifts due to an influx of orders, so the demand for businesses wanting smaller production runs is certainly there,” says Mr Fitzhenry.

“With three factories, we are now a fully-fledged contract manufacturer and packaging supplier catering for liquids, dry and soluble powder, dry food, animal health supplement and human health powders and capsules.”

The expansion follows the business recently establishing a factory in northern NSW in June of last year, which focuses on manufacturing and packaging liquid and granular fertilisers.

Plant Doctor is a Gold Coast-based company that supplies exceptional Earth-friendly products to help plants, animals and people grow and has two Gold Coast Business Excellence Awards (monthly winner of the Family Business category) to its name.