Behind the Scenes with Yumfu
Yumfu’s founder, Callum Weir, is a certified plant-based nutritionist but also a ‘digital nomad’. Lisa catches up with Callum to find out the realities of running a company from the road, and asks if you can successfully combine business and travel.
Since this interview, Callum has rebranded as Plant Fuelled. See his website: www.plantfuelled.co.uk
I have to start by asking: where are you now, where have you come from, and where are you going next?
At the moment I am in British Columbia in Canada, but in 7 hours I’ll be crossing the border into Seattle to work my way down the west coast of the USA to pick up a flight to Australia. Before this, I was in Guatemala after working my way up through South and Central America.
What got you interested in nutrition, and at what point did you think you could turn it into the business that Yumfu is now?
I would love to give a simple answer such as I was heavily invested in food and the effect it has on the body, however this wasn’t the case. From a young age I always had a love/hate relationship with food, jumping on the next bandwagon when it came to diet trends and hoping I would see a successful outcome in my health and wellbeing. But truthfully, I spent many years yo-yo dieting.
This is when I took time to stop and think. Instead of taking someone else’s words for what I should be doing with food to make me ‘healthier’ I decided to take it into my own hands. I would learn about the world of nutrition, get my qualifications and then use this knowledge on myself. When you delve into nutrition you discover some very haunting things about the foods we are consuming – things that once you learn you cannot forget. I was already vegan at that point, however a burger and Oreo-eating vegan, but everything I learned pointed towards whole-food plant-based eating as being what led to optimal health (of course, with the occasional pizza here and there as balance!).
I never intended to start a business from it but at that time there was a gap in the market for nutritionists that specialise in a whole-food plant-based diets. There were a lot of personal trainers who had vegan nutrition plans for certain goals, but not many people promoting whole-foods. I jumped in thinking it would be a side project but fast forward a few years and it’s still my main job. Never did I think this would work out the way it has.
"When you see ‘digital nomads’ online they are only sharing the parts they want you to see and never the downside."
You are a certified plant-based nutritionist, but you work with a lot of non-vegan clients too. What reasons do you get from meat-eaters about why they are interested in learning more about a plant-based diet?
The meat-eating clients that I have had the pleasure of working with have a mixture of different reasons for wanting to learn about plant-based. Each and every one of them has their own story about why they want to change their habits, but some reasons do come up again and again. Many start a flexitarian diet, find they enjoy the food and decide to go the whole way. Others had their eyes opened, normally through a documentary, about the impacts of what we do on animals, the planet, or our health, and have decided they don’t want to partake in those acts anymore. One of my clients decided that they wanted to prove to their gym buddies that it was absolutely possible to gain the same amount of muscle on a plant-based diet. He wasn’t vegan at the time, he just wanted to make a point and prove all his friends wrong after watching Game Changers. He smashed it and now he’s vegan, but it was never his intention to change his diet completely.
A lot of people might have thought about running a business while travelling but are too worried about practical things, like being able to get a reliable internet connection when on the road. How hard is it to run a business and travel at the same time?
I would love to tell you it’s easy and nothing goes wrong, however that would be far from the truth. When you see ‘digital nomads’ online they are only sharing the parts they want you to see and never the downside. 90% of the time it’s actually very easy because the majority of places have very good Wi-Fi, especially inside cafes and hostels, but the downsides are time differences and unexpected situations that arise.
The majority of my clients are in the UK and, depending on where I am, I’m normally six to eight hours behind. So that means sometimes booking consultations for 3am my time because that’s the only time the client has between their working lives. One time, I took an overnight bus which was meant to take ten hours, but due to a landslide I was stuck on this bus for thirty-two hours. There was no connection to be able to communicate with clients to let them know and reschedule their appointments. I could only apologise afterwards, but luckily vegans seems a lot more understanding of these situations.
And there can be times when you are meant to be doing a full day’s work, yet something exciting comes along that you would much rather be doing instead! I would rather be jumping off a waterfall than replying to emails for instance, but you need to make sacrifices so that you have a financially sustainable business that will keep your journey going. But it’s all about balance; sometimes you can leave those emails for another day, and as long as you can manage your time and schedules without burning yourself out then a digital nomadic lifestyle can be done pretty easily. You just need to accept that some things will go wrong and there’s nothing you can do about it. So don’t stress, work with what you have, and accept you’ll be giving a few apologies down the line.
You also present the Plant Fuelled Podcast on Spotify and iTunes. What effect has podcasting had on your business?
The podcast was only meant to be a bit of fun, an excuse to talk to people from all different backgrounds and get stories from different people in the vegan field. Such as exploring gut microbes on a vegan diet with a specialist gut doctor, talking with plant-based athletes or hearing from people with life-changing stories about how a plant-based diet helped them overcome their struggles. I only really started the podcast to help me learn more, I didn’t know if people were even going to listen to it because I didn’t promote it anywhere apart from on my Yumfu Instagram page. However, people did tune in and wanted to join me on this learning experience which has led to a small, close, proactive and supportive community building on my page.
Having a podcast has also led to business conversions too, which of course is amazing, but getting to talk to a bunch of people from all around the world, with no connections to each other apart from the fact they all follow the same vegan lifestyle, is beautiful to see. There’s so much positivity and passion for the movement with everyone showing support, asking each other for advice and all feeling that they are part of something.
If someone was thinking about taking their business on the road to improve their work/life balance, what are your top tips for getting started?
If your job allows you to get on the road and travel, then just take the jump and do it. Don’t overthink it, just work it out along the way. There is no right or wrong way to do it, but if you don’t try at all then there will always be a ‘what-if?’.
It will take time to get used to it. It will be new and exciting and you will make mistakes, but that’s part of the journey. It’s easy to stress over the things that go wrong but that’s the past and there is nothing you can do to change it, so instead accept these things as part of the learning curve. It will take time to work out what the optimal work/life balance is for you, it won’t come on day one, but it will work out. Start by living as cheaply as possible such as staying in hostels, cooking for yourself and getting around on the cheapest transport. This way you’ve always got a reserve in case something does happen.
And remember that comparison is the thief of joy. Don’t compare yourself to other digital nomads, because remember that you only see or hear the parts that they want to show you. Everyone has their struggles and you cannot compare someone who’s been doing it for a few weeks to someone who’s been doing it for four years. So don’t be afraid to ask for help, join the Facebook digital nomad communities, visit coworking spaces and talk to people that you meet on the road doing the same thing. People are more willing to help than you may think – just keep an open mind, stay positive and everything should be fine. Peace and plants.
