PRODUCING THE GOODS

FIONA'S ACCIDENTAL FRIDGE DISCOVERY HAS LED TO A SIX-FIGURE BUSINESS

-  Emma Levett

When you think of the word "accident", you usually equate it with a fall, sustaining an injury or something broken that ends up being costly to fix - it's rarely something that ends up earning you a small fortune. However, Fiona Raphael's seemingly simple accident did exactly that and has changed her life for the better.

It came about in 2021 when Fiona, now 38, from Sydney, was on maternity leave from her job as a criminal lawyer. Her son, Monty, was using cloth nappies and she started finding ingenious uses for the wet bags the nappies came with. Made from polyurethane laminate (PUL), these bags help prevent moisture leaks, so Fiona started using them - instead of plastic bags - to store umbrellas, swimmers and even fresh veggies by placing them in the fridge.

"It worked so well. There was no condensation building up and the veggies lasted longer," she tells WHO.