From 1000 bulls to 100,000 strawberries: How a Wānaka couple built a fruit and herb empire
Sunday, 8 February 2026
On a terrace above the Clutha River, tourists can find some of Central Otago’s sweetest treats, as well as exotic herbs, at a family-run farm. Mike White reports.
Seven years ago, Bex and Ben Trotter were sharing a Wānaka flat with six others, were flat out with corporate jobs, and had a hankering for a rural lifestyle.
Today, 10km away, they’ve got a 135ha farm where they run 1000 bulls, a thriving business growing strawberries, herbs, and melons, and four young children.
Some of it has been planned, some of it has been a whim, some of it has been happy accident.
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Ben came from a sheep and beef farm, and Bex grew up on a dairy farm, and they met at Cambridge Young Farmers 15 years ago.
So taking over the bull farm, sandwiched between Wānaka Airport and the Clutha River, wasn’t too far out of their comfort zone, with the meat from their animals going into the beef and hamburger market.
But before long, Bex started remembering the strawberries she used to pick as a kid in Bay of Plenty, and noticed nobody was doing it down south.
So they dug up a patch of their back lawn, put in a trial crop, “and we just had an abundance of strawberries,” Bex recalls.
They started researching, talking to people about commercial strawberry-growing, and sourcing plants.
“We weren’t from a horticultural background, so we watched YouTube videos. We just had no idea what we were in for.”
In June 2021, they put in 30,000 strawberry plants, and a few months later opened the region’s first Pick Your Own strawberry patch. They were fleeced within a day.
The next year, they put in another 50,000 plants, and now have over 100,000, supplying a daily deluge of PYO tourists between November and April, nearly all Wānaka’s restaurants, the town’s supermarkets, and specialist outlets like Nadia Lim’s Royalburn Farm.
Called Red Bridge Berries, the name pays homage to the famous, if slightly faded, iron bridge across the Clutha, just downstream of their farm, at Luggate.
Beside the strawberry rows, they grow watermelons and rock melons, utilising spare space, and providing a perfect culinary match for customers.
In 2023, when looking to grow more strawberries, they got wind of a bloke in Cromwell who’d just closed his herb business, and went to ask if they could rent his tunnel houses over winter.
They ended up buying his business, and shifting the tunnel houses to their farm, despite knowing nothing about growing herbs.
They now produce more than 25 types of herbs and salad greens, from more common things like mint, basil, parsley and coriander, to exotic species such as red-veined sorrel, bamboo shoots, and purple shiso.
Their herbs and edible flowers, under the Alpine Fresh brand, are also sold through supermarkets, and to restaurants, including top-end Queenstown establishments like Amisfield.
“Chefs come and ask for something obscure,” says Ben, “and we’ll go and grow it for them.”
In addition, the chefs love being able to have herbs that were picked that afternoon, on plates that evening, says Ben.
The herbs are grown in a 2500m² hydroponic operation, allowing them to produce five-times the amount they would if grown outdoors, while using 98% less water.
The couple’s produce is at the premium end of the market, commanding higher prices.
But Bex says once chefs sample the flavour and extraordinary sweetness of their strawberries, they don’t go back.
Part of their success has been choosing a variety of strawberry that has a low yield, but very high brix or sugar level.
Bex, formerly a top adventure racer, says they’re both inquisitive people, and like to try new things. So this year they planted 12ha of carrots to supply a European company with seed.
Somehow, throughout this, and alongside their fast-growing horticultural and farming businesses, the couple have had four children: Florence, 6, Eddie, 5, Arthur, 3, and one-year-old William.
“It’s extremely hard work,” says Bex. “We literally work every single day of the week, every day of the year. There’s no weekend off, there’s no holidays.
“But when you love what you do, a lot of the time it doesn’t feel like work.
“And we chose this life. We created this for our family because we want our kids to see us in a job, working, and realise what hard work can get you.”
Summer is their busiest season, with the PYO strawberry patch being a popular outing from nearby Wānaka.
But sometimes the customers love their produce just a bit too much.
Over the season, Bex estimates punters eat 200gm each on average while picking - that’s a free kilo per family.
She says the locals are very respectful, but tourists often treat it as lunch, rather than just sampling a few, blind to the cost of running the strawberry patch, or the value of the produce.
Nothing from what the farm produces is wasted, with strawberries going into ice creams, being sold frozen, or made into sauces and balsamic dressing.
Bex, 37, says it’s been nerve-racking at times to start new businesses they had no experience in, but they’ve had great support from the local community, and have wonderfully loyal staff.
And she pays tribute to Ben, 38, for being able to grasp new concepts and quickly become an expert in them.
“At the start, people told us we were crazy, and we’d go bankrupt. Lots of people said we’d never grow a strawberry in Wānaka because it’s too cold.
“But I love being able to prove people wrong.
“I think we’re lucky with what we’ve got, and what we’ve created. I feel like we’ve got everything that we probably dreamed of, and more.”