Sharing snippets of life as a camel farmer online has opened up a whole raft of opportunities for a family farm on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast.
Yasmin Brisbane films herself working alongside her parents on their family-owned camel dairy, Q Camel, near Beerwah, where they produce camel milk and other products.
“I started posting last year, and then I got to 500,000 followers pretty quickly and all of a sudden it just became this big beast,” Yasmin said.
“It’s really become a big part of the business and how we run things here.”
Patrick the TikTok star
Yasmin is the face in the spotlight, but she has competition when it comes to being the star of the show.
In particular, a camel named Patrick has attracted a devoted fanbase after Yasmin shared some of his antics on the video-sharing app TikTok.
“It was just a normal day — he got stuck on the opposite side of a fence, and I rescued him,” Yasmin said.
“I was talking to him the whole time because, like, all crazy animal people, I talk to animals.
“I was having this argument with him, and I filmed it all, and I uploaded it thinking, ‘Oh, yeah, it’s just a funny little video.'”
Eight-point-three million views later, that funny little video has had a big impact.
“It’s been fantastic,” said Lauren Brisbane, director of Q Camel, and Yasmin’s mother.
“We’ve had at least a 30 to 40, if not 50 per cent, increase in our tourism.”
The family had been running Saturday tours of their property once a month, which they’ve now increased to weekly.
“We’ve doubled the numbers that we’ve got on that — the tourism has doubled and then quadrupled, and then the overall business is about a 20 to 30 per cent increase,” Yasmin said.
Lauren Brisbane is all for her daughter putting a different spin on modern farming by sharing snippets of their daily life online.
“I love what she’s been doing,” Lauren said.
“The great thing about it is that she’s been teaching people about camels and that they’re not the scary creatures that a lot of people think they are, that they’re kind and gentle and that they’ve got a really great purpose here in Australia.”
Showcasing farm life to the masses
Lauren Brisbane is a passionate advocate for camels in Australian agriculture.
She wrote and published a two-year study in 2009 looking at camels in Queensland and the opportunities they presented for diversification.
Before long, the family was buying its first herd of 20 camels and figuring out how best to manage the animals.
“We just learned as we went along and … these camels had never had a hand on them,” Lauren said.
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“So we had to develop a relationship with them and then learn how to milk them.”
For Yasmin, showcasing life as an Australian camel farmer to the world gives her a chance to combine her two big passions: farming and performing.
A trained actor, Yasmin has worked on both films and in television and, in recent years, has starred in numerous commercials.
“I was working more and more on the farm, and then I just got to a point where I couldn’t choose between the two, and I had so much responsibility here, and I really loved it,” she said.
“The filming and performing arts are going really well, so I just made them work [as] … this hybrid.”
Although Yasmin doesn’t make money from posting video content on TikTok, what she can do is channel that online audience to the farm.
“I’ll start funnelling it more into Instagram, and when you’re on Instagram, you can start making brand deals and things like that,” Yasmin said.
Balancing real life with digital life
Just as farmers enjoy connecting with other farmers in the real world, Yasmin says online that’s equally important, especially when it comes to navigating any challenges that arise.
“People kind of demand that … free entertainment, and they … take a lot of liberties with you sometimes,” Yasmin said.
“I talk with a lot of other female farmers and content creators about para-social relationships and basically people thinking that because you’re on their screens and you entertain them, that they kind of have like a right to tell you things and comment on things and accuse you of things.
“Don’t get me wrong, 95 per cent of my experience is amazing, but it can be exhausting.”
Fortunately, Yasmin’s parents see the value in her work, both physically on the farm and online, showcasing it.
“It’s a lovely part of the way we live now that people get to see what other people do around the world,” Lauren said.
“You know it brightens their day, and they learn something new, and I think you know it opens the world up to so many people, so it’s great.”
There are plans underway to take Q Camel to the world in a physical sense, in addition to online.
“This year we’re going to export,” Lauren said.
“We’ve got customers waiting, particularly in Asia, for our milk, so that’s our next step.”
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