Photo: Heather van Zyl
Heather van Zyl’s late mother, Joey, taught her to bake the perfect rusk when she was still a teenager in the Eastern Cape district of Ugie. It was a treasured skill that decades later she used as the cornerstone for her Heavanz (an amalgamation of the names Heather and Van Zyl) rusk business.
Besides the skill of being able to produce delicious rusks using the secret family recipe, an added ingredient to her success has undoubtedly been her work ethic.
This is maybe best reflected by the fact that despite being a teacher and with no experience in the bakery business, she has managed to consolidate the successful Heavanz rusk brand across large swathes of the country. “I have never been able to sit still,’’ she explains. “I just can’t do nothing.’’
Turning to rusks
Heavanz Rusks is a product of Heather’s industrious nature, which was responsible for a couple of farm-based enterprises she had launched after settling on Van Zylsrust with husband, Pierre Van Zyl, in 1989.
In fact, by the early 1990s, she was speculating with Angora goats after a crash in the Mohair price opened an opportunity to source goats from disillusioned mohair producers and then sell them for slaughter in the former Transkei. But when Mohair prices stabilised, the once-lucrative opportunity vanished overnight.
She then began breeding and slaughtering pigs in the mid-1990s and was soon supplying pork into the former Transkei. However, after a decade of lucrative trade, the individual who purchased the bulk of her pork began to slaughter his own pigs. She was never to recover from this unexpected turn of events and sold all her pigs in 2004.
Not long after this disappointment, Pierre convinced her to pursue rusk production as a new business venture. He argued that her baking skills could lay the foundation for a profitable business and soon the Van Zylsrust farm kitchen was in full rusk production to satisfy the demands of neighbours, friends, and family.
In 2006, more rusk orders forced Heather to repurpose her old butchery into a bakery with affordable baking equipment including an oven, mixer, and dryer (all still in service today). Once she was able to ensure consistent quality rusk production in the now more industrialised baking environment, she began to distribute rusks beyond the Lady Grey district.
From that point onwards she only increased production as dictated by her growing market and was determined to avoid slipping into debt at all costs, a philosophy that would stand her in good stead in the face of COVID-19 pandemic restrictions.
“I survived COVID because I did not have debt and I didn’t need to rent a building,’’ she says. ‘’My advice to anybody attempting to establish a similar venture is therefore to start small and be patient.’’
Quality and variety
The Heavanz bakery soon proved to be a huge success and is now producing 60t of rusks a year. The key to this success is her well-trained staff of four.
“All my employees are equipped to do and manage every step of the baking process including to mix, bake, package and distribute,’’ says Heather. “We organise ourselves as best possible, to ensure optimal production.’’
She was particularly careful not to sacrifice quality when beginning to produce greater volumes of rusks in her new bakery. “I think when you industrialise the [baking] process for the sake of volumes, you risk losing quality. To me, quality has always been non-negotiable.’’
For example, she her rusks are not baked with processed yeast, but rather a natural yeast produced from a maize starter. “Before I was married, my mother made me a starter and it has never died,’’ she says. “From that starter I produced more. I now have 30.’’
Heather also does not shy away from going to exceptional trouble to source only the best ingredients for her rusks. For example, nuts are sourced from Nelspruit (Mpumalanga), and Hartswater (Northern Cape) while the best-quality butter and eggs (powdered eggs are an abomination to her!) are sourced locally, as she believes in investing in local communities.
At first, she only baked traditional boerebeskuit and aniseed rusks, but in the past 12 years has added nine more varieties (walnut; pecan; macadamia; high-fibre low-sugar; walnut and cherry health; buttermilk; butter and bran; and seeds). She plans to launch a new almond and coconut rusk next year that will double as her 12th variety.
“We introduce new varieties to keep our products exciting and to ensure that people don’t get bored,’’ says Heather. “We also enjoy experimenting with new recipes; it brings us joy to try out something new.’’
Marketing and distribution
Heather says the most valuable form of marketing has been word of mouth. “People taste my rusks and talk about it to others. This simple spreading of the word remains the most effective form of marketing.’’
In fact, it is what fuelled the Heavanz rusk brand long before the use of Facebook and WhatsApp platforms or, most recently, a website.
Heather also stresses the importance of merchandising one’s own product, just to make sure it is displayed as attractively as possible in all outlets.
But even more crucial not only in terms of presentation but marketing in a broader sense, is the packaging of her rusks. “If your packaging isn’t good, then your product in it isn’t represented well either. Quality packaging is therefore absolutely crucial.’’
Distribution of her rusks in multiple provinces has over the years proved tricky as she depended on courier services that often damaged the product while in transit. She has adapted by packing the rusks more carefully using supporting materials, and only uses pudo, which employs a smart locker-to-locker delivery system.
She also recently purchased a VW Caddy and trailer and has taken control of the distribution of rusks down to East London and up to Bloemfontein. Today Heavanz rusks can be found far and wide across South Africa, from large Spar outlets in cities to 16 OVK outlets across the Eastern Cape and Free State platteland, to small coffee shops and grocery stores as far afield as KwaZulu-Natal and North West.
It seems inevitable that the spread of Heavanz rusks will move beyond their current outposts in the country, bringing the unique taste and quality of Heather’s rusks to more and more appreciative customers.
Phone Heather van Zyl on 084 867 8097, or email her at [email protected].
