'SA WILL ALWAYS BE PART OF ME'

Cindy Nell-Roberts is starting a new lite Down Under with her family. She tells YOU about the chaotic but happy p ansliepent why shes missing home

- MARELIZE GRBICH

SHE had a picture-perfect life: a gorgeous home in Camps Bay, Cape Town, a successful cosmetics business and a profile as a well-known TV personality.

So when former Miss South Africa Cindy Nell-Roberts announced she and her family were moving to Melbourne, Australia, people were stunned.

Why would she give up the good life? But Cindy has a simple answer: it all boils down to a need for growth, she says.

“One day I had a conversation with the Lord and asked, ‘What’s next for me? Am I supposed to do what I’m doing now forever?’ I got this overwhelming message saying, ‘I have bigger plans for you. When the opportunity comes you will know’.

“I almost don’t want to tell people this because it sounds so bizarre, but very shortly after that, this came for us.”

She’s talking about the business opportunity that spurred the family’s move Down Under. Cindy (43) and her husband, Clive (51), have built a successful enterprise with Cosmetix, a company that imports and distributes makeup and beauty brands Essence and Catrice from Germany.

During a lunch with their German manufacturers, she casually mentioned she thought they could increase their footprint and distribute the products in Australia.

When their associates agreed, the couple started a two-year process during which they sold Cosmetix, got a licence to distribute the brands in Australia and packed up their lives.

Uprooting their kids, Ethan (13) and Aenea (11), wasn’t an easy decision, but it helped that they involved them from the start. “We asked them what they thought of the idea. They obviously wondered what it was like there and how the people are,” Cindy says.