Career-changing ex-teacher turns tiny cafe into award-winning mega business

Opening a small cafe with coffee and some sandwiches was her husband’s dream, not Toni Vorenas’s.

“[But] before we opened, he actually decided that wasn’t his dream anymore,” Ms Vorenas said.

“Because he’d supported me a lot throughout my teaching career and my studies, I thought in return I would run the cafe for 12 months for him.”

Without meaning to, 12 months has turned into 12 years and a two-site award-winning bakery and cafe serving 150 customers from two commercial kitchens, a bar and function room.

Determined to find purpose in a corporate world, the former deputy principal has devoted her business to employing and empowering people from a wide mix of backgrounds and credits that diversity to Metro’s success.