Pacific Business News

June 15, 2001

By Debbie Sokei
Pacific Business News

German entrepreneurs go nuts to stay in Hawaii

Several acres of macadamia nut trees on the Big Island helped keep two German nationals in the state they've come to love. Christian Bernadzik and his girlfriend, Monika Nauen, were on a business visa and bought a macadamia nut farm.
Shortly after arriving in 1997 the couple bought the 15-acre property --- with an ocean view and two nearby volcanic craters --- although they knew nothing about the business. In fact, Bernadzik got his first taste of the crunchy nuts on a plane ride coming here.
"We had nothing," says Bernadzik. " The first thing we bought was a car, then the farm."
Bernadzik and Nauen paid $ **,***.**, down from $ ***,***.**, for 1,100 mac nut trees and Started MaC's Nut Company of Hawaii. MaC is for Monika and Christian.
At first they only harvested the nuts and sold them to candy companies, but after month of learning about farming by talking to other farmers, Bernadzik and Nauen decided they could pick, husk, pack and sell their own nuts --- and do it better.
" This is when we started to think about processing them, but we didn't want to do them they same way," says Nauen. "We always thought our nuts taste better than what you buy in the cans."
They invested upwards of another $ 250,000.00 for a dehydrator, husker and other machines to ensure top quality.
"When you go shopping you don't go shopping to buy old fruits," he says.
After having family and friends sample their creations the couple began marketing their nuts in January 2000.
Most of the revenue generated from the sale of the plain, lightly salted, ginger or garlic salted and lava red with chili peppers packaged nuts are done on the Internet, www.macadamia-nut.com.
"You have to work very hard to make a living here," she says. "Fifteen acres of macadamia nuts for us is so big, so huge because we come from Germany. But when you are in it it's nothing. To make a living you need 50 acres."
Bernadzik says most of the work is still done by hand and they make just enough money to keep the business going.
"We can say we almost break even. Every year we go to our bank account and transfer some money from Germany to the United States," he says. " If the truck breaks and we have to spend $1,500 to repair it you have to sell a lot of nuts to repair the truck."
To help offset their living expenses Bernadzik designs Web pages and software and they also run a bed and breakfast, MaC's Inn Hawaii, where visitors get a complete tour of the Puna area, including hidden beaches, and get to pick nuts on the farm.
Most of their guest are from Canada and the Mainland. The cost to stay at the B&B is $105 for two for one night; an additional adult is $25.
"If we would have guessed, all year around it's easy money without so much work," says Bernadzik. "We get some dollars but to get rich with it? No way."