Healthy Monsters: Whipping up nutritious meals on the go

MANILA, Philippines - “About five years ago, I gave birth to my first son and I was just looking for a diet that more or less fit me.  What I did was eat 30 different salads for 30 days,” Nikki shared.

Months later, Healthy Monsters came to be—breaking the traditional plated salad dishes. 

Nikki created  super nutritious and colorful salads-in-a-jar, the perfect alternative “packed-lunch,” picnic treat or to eat on the go, delivered right at one’s doorstep.

She started posting her freshly made salads on Instagram and gained the attention of her friends who suggested to make it an official business venture. In 2012 and with a minimal budget of P10,000, Nikki decided to get into salad making in a jar—the first of its kind in Manila.

“If I want to resell my salads, how am I going to be different from all the others? And that was the time when mason jars are a thing. If you put it in a jar, you get to preserve it much longer. It’s inspired from what I see online and restaurants that I go to but I still make my own,” she said.

While Nikki has already been experimenting on other businesses several years ago—she tried creating her own shoe line and reselling Korean clothes—the food business was the most successful she had so far.

“I didn’t really expect it to work because my background is totally different. And this apparently works. I believe people are very curious about new ideas and they are very willing to try,” the former public relations practitioner said.

While Instagram was relatively new in 2012 and people were just starting to get the hang of the photo-sharing app, Healthy Monsters was among the first few stores that had delivery services.

“I am lucky to have friends who know some celebrities so I ask them favors, I send samples of my salads, they take photos and post it. My style was actually very amateur but very personal and that’s what I think worked. Word of mouth is really important,” the Fashion Marketing graduate from the SoFA Design Institute said.

The name Healthy Monsters was also inspired by his son Jordan who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at a very young age.

“I wanted to eat and healthy for him, to be a good example for him so that he will grow up around vegetables and fruits. He is my healthy monster,” Nikki said.

Nikki used to go to every house for delivery by hiring serviced vans but now she has riders to do the task as she now caters to about 300 jar deliveries every week.

“In the beginning, I didn’t have a minimum so people would just order one jar because they are curious but then I found that i wouldn’t make profit out of that. So I tried to have a minimum seven jars per order and people were okay with it and that’s what I do until now,” Nikki said.

The P190-salad jar—which contains various organic produce from lettuce to cucumber to grape tomatoes to cilantro to romaine to walnuts—are all bestsellers.

“What’s good with the salad business is that you don’t use up electricity that much. You don’t have to cook and I make my salads fresh so I don’t really store it. After I make the salads, it’s for delivery already,” she said.

While the idea of putting up a pop-up store to cater to more customers crossed her mind, Nikki admitted that the idea still seemed to be a long-shot given lack of manpower and time as  as she juggles her job as a full-time mom and attends to everyday order requests.

“I’m running everything, it’s a one-man show. Hopefully in the future when I have more funding and budget and if I find a good location... Probably when my kids are older, maybe around two to three years from now,” Nikki said.

“I want to put up a health store not just on salads but more like on the-go meals, a fast food like 7/11 but all healthy stuff and i just don’t want to keep it exclusive to Healthy Monsters. I also want other brands to join if they like,” she added.

The 30-year-old mom also considers the possibility of having her salad products in the shelves of some supermarkets and even create a smaller and cheaper version of her salads that can be provided to schools and other events.

“I get a lot of inquiries from offices and schools if I can cater to their school events and meetings but of course they are on a budget. So what I want to do is to create P50-salads, it will not be in jars since it’s going to be consumed that day. That’s also my vision,” she revealed.

While Nikki tries to target as many market as possible, majority of her customers are women with ages ranging from 30 to 40, as well as millennials who are trying to start a healthy routine.

“I think it’s also a good investment especially nowadays when everything’s artificial and synthetic. It’s nice to know that Filipinos are more health conscious since there’s so much sickness going around. It’s nice to think backwards when it comes to agriculture and just go back to the basics,” Nikki said.

“I think that’s why Healthy Monsters really clicked and worked because I started it at the time when people were looking for that option,” she added.

With what started as two salad varieties has now expanded to seven types of salads, cleansing juices and even lactation energy bars for mothers.

“Majority of the sales still go to the salads. But I also created cleanses which not all juice companies have. I have the 72-hour juice cleanse which targets the major organs in your body for detox and I also have raw star diet which is a combination of juice and salad,” Nikki said.

Nikki sources some of her organic produce from Lotus Pod Farm in Bay, Laguna owned by veteran journalist Cheche Lazaro and from other small farmers in various areas.

“Since it’s organic, it really does not grow that fast compared to the ones that use fertilizers. I have different suppliers and I like supporting small farmers. It gives them better opportunities to dispose their products because aside from me, my clients also ask where they can get organic produce so I give them the contacts (of the farmers),” Nikki shared.

Banking on the height of technology and digital age, Nikki continues to improve on her social media marketing to expand her reach as she believes it is the platform where more opportunities lie.

“Social media is the easiest and cheapest way to get your product out there. Nowadays, everybody wants something instant and people are too lazy to go to the store and just want everything delivered at their doorstep. People really listen to reviews nowadays and that I think is really important,” she said.

“I think what keeps people interested is not just the food itself but the service I provide. I really take my time to answer their questions and give in to their request. Customer service is also something that i prioritize,” Nikki added.