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After a back injury ended his plumbing apprenticeship at 20, Kosta Kostidis found a new career making Greek bougatsa with guidance from his family. Encouraged by his cousin's husband, Patrick LaManna, he launched a food van before opening Bougatsaki on Sydney Road in Brunswick. The business has since sold thousands of pastries at festivals, parties and sporting events.
A serious back injury ended his career as a plumber at age 20, and aside from being painful, it left Kosta Kostidis at a loss as to what to do for a living.
But the love and advice of relatives, including his 89-year-old grandfather, helped Kostidis find a sweet but very different career — in the field of Greek pastries. Kosta Kostidis , with Yianni Palazi, serves bougatsa pastries at his new shop, Bougatsaki, in Brunswick. A few weeks ago, two years after the injury, Kostidis opened a small shop in Sydney Road, Brunswick, whose prime product is a custard-filled pastry called bougatsa.
There’s a symmetry to the move, given Kostidis’s pappou , Efthimios Oplopiadis, is a former baker. In 2024, Kostidis was a fourth-year apprentice plumber when he “did his back” on a job in Melbourne’s south-east.
“I was out of work for a year, seeing physios and specialists,” he said. “It was not fun,” he said. “For a couple of months, it was really bad. ” When Kostidis felt better, he was keen to work, but there was a problem: “I had no idea what I wanted to do.
”While at home in Coburg, he would make bougatsas with his pappou, and had the idea of selling pastries. Oplopiadis had worked as a baker in Melbourne factories for 30 years after migrating from Greece in 1968 and liked to make pastries at home. His daughter, Kosta’s mother Martha Oplopiadis, says bougatsas have been a staple of family gatherings, as a dessert, for generations. One year ago, Kostidis started a food van selling bougatsas, which took off.
He has worked at parties, festivals and soccer games. Chris Hopkins In February at the Antipodes Festival in Lonsdale Street, in Melbourne’s CBD, Kostidis, his mother, his sister, Danean, and cousin Lynda LaManna helped Kosta sell more than 3000 bougatsas in three days. AdvertisementAnd his mentor – his cousin’s husband, LaManna Supermarket chief executive Patrick LaManna – encouraged him to focus on bougatsas.
“To be honest, I’m not too sure what I would have done without Patrick and my mum. Coming off a year when I wasn’t working and was just lost, they helped me find myself, pretty much,” Kostidis said. His grandfather, to whom he has always been close, has also been a great support, being a sounding board, and suggesting ingredients, including savoury fillings. Oplopiadis said he liked that Kostidis had opened a shop.
“He started slowly and has been steadily progressing and coming up with new ideas,” Oplopiadis said. Oplopiadis, originally from the city of Serres, in northern Greece, reckons that bougatsas will draw customers.
“You see, when you eat bougatsa, it makes you happy, it’s not a heavy dessert. It has light, velvety custard, it’s just delicious,” he said. Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights.
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Former Plumber Finds Success Selling Greek Bougatsa in MelbourneKosta Kostidis turned to baking Greek pastries after a serious back injury ended his plumbing apprenticeship. Inspired by his 89-year-old grandfather, a former baker, he began selling bougatsa from a food van before opening Bougatsaki on Sydney Road in Brunswick. The family business has since sold thousands of pastries at festivals and other events.
Read more »