how ave – absolute vegan empire (now known as velivery) – came into being

While the Latin word “Ave” – which means “be well!” or “farewell” – doesn’t actually have all that much to do with the following story about how Absolute Vegan Empire (AVE) was brought into being by founder Tobias Graf, what both have in common is the desire to strive towards living well.

At the age of 18 years young, when he met his future wife, Tobias Graf – who died in 2014 at the age of just 35 – had long since made the decision to lead a vegan lifestyle. This decision, which was set in stone, was doubtless brought about in part by the school trip to a slaughterhouse he had been on two years earlier, which had shaped him deeply and had made him become a vegetarian practically overnight.

Vision

His favorite hardcore bands at the time, “Earth Crisis” and “Morning again” – whose lyrics focused on the straight edge movement and the exploitation of animals – also reinforced his resolve in terms of his decision to lead a purely vegan lifestyle and to promote this vision in the world around him.

After completing an apprenticeship at the department store Hertie (now known as Karstadt) in the German town of Weiden, the staunch pacifist chose to complete a year's civilian service in an old people’s home rather than doing Army training. He then went on to work for Karstadt for a further year before making his dream of being his own boss a reality in 2001, when he established AVE.

foundation of the vantastic foods brand

Even back then, he found the concept of a good friend, who ran a vegan store, extremely exciting and far-sighted, but on his advice he decided to import vegan goods from abroad or have them produced.

Initially, these were mainly vegan bars and snack sausages, which he sold under the table to headbanging protagonists at hardcore concerts together with stickers and patches, but later this became a whole range of plant-based products for everyone.

In 2004, the Vantastic Foods brand was founded, which mainly came up with soy and other meat/sausage substitutes that were painstakingly and personally collected from the Czech Republic. The cooperation with a bakery also contributed enormously to Vantastic Foods being able to include more and more products in its sustainable range.

The breakthrough was achieved...

The business’s operations room for packaging and dispatches was to be found in the garage and cellar of Tobias’ parents’ house. A logical consequence of this was, of course, that he renovated his childhood bedroom into a tasteful, bustling office. In 2007, when the company started to grow apace and Tobias’ parents’ place was overflowing, he had no option but to have the first warehouse built in Nabburg. Once the warehouse was completed, Tobias was able to gain a whole army of staff for the project: one picker, one packer and one office lady.

When the company’s largest client at the time, “alles-vegetarisch.de” was up for sale, Tobias Graf decided to take over this company too, build up their online shop and successfully bring the – now fully veganized – range up to date.

He had managed to break into the market, and the fact that he was getting over 1000 orders a day – at Christmas, of all times – spoke for itself and for Tobias Graf’s vision of the future.

He was a visionary and a doer who always made the time to listen to his staff, was full of new ideas, was incredibly fair, generous and a real family-guy at heart. This plant-based motivation machine of a man was able to win over everyone he came into contact with, as his convictions about an alternative – or perhaps even better – lifestyle ran through his veins from an early age.

And so it was that a tiny seed grew into a delicate plant, from there into a whole bed of flowers, and then even into a unique Garden of Eden with a varied range of products from which anyone who wishes to may eat...

The breakthrough was achieved...

The business’s operations room for packaging and dispatches was to be found in the garage and cellar of Tobias’ parents’ house. A logical consequence of this was, of course, that he renovated his childhood bedroom into a tasteful, bustling office. In 2007, when the company started to grow apace and Tobias’ parents’ place was overflowing, he had no option but to have the first warehouse built in Nabburg. Once the warehouse was completed, Tobias was able to gain a whole army of staff for the project: one picker, one packer and one office lady.

When the company’s largest client at the time, “alles-vegetarisch.de” was up for sale, Tobias Graf decided to take over this company too, build up their online shop and successfully bring the – now fully veganized – range up to date.

He had managed to break into the market, and the fact that he was getting over 1000 orders a day – at Christmas, of all times – spoke for itself and for Tobias Graf’s vision of the future.

He was a visionary and a doer who always made the time to listen to his staff, was full of new ideas, was incredibly fair, generous and a real family-guy at heart. This plant-based motivation machine of a man was able to win over everyone he came into contact with, as his convictions about an alternative – or perhaps even better – lifestyle ran through his veins from an early age.

And so it was that a tiny seed grew into a delicate plant, from there into a whole bed of flowers, and then even into a unique Garden of Eden with a varied range of products from which anyone who wishes to may eat...