I run a £119m company but don’t own a car and stick my shoes together with superglue – I’m just not interested in money
A NAN who became a millionaire thanks to PEAS has shared just how she did it.
Christine Lewington dubs herself the Pea Queen thanks to her multi-million-pound food business.
The 51-year-old creates a protein powder out of yellow peas – a humble vegetable with an earthier flavour than Britain’s much-loved green peas.
She says that she invested every spare penny into launching a new technology that derived protein from the peas.
Today, her business is worth an eye-watering £119 million.
But Christine doesn’t let the figures go to her head – she borrows her friend’s car to get around and uses super glue to fix holes in her shoes instead of buying new ones.
She also lives in a small city in called Lethbridge in Canada, rather than using her wealth to buy a beach house in Miami or penthouse in New York.
Christine once turned down £30 million in cash to share her brand’s secrets.
“Growing up I had one pair of shoes each school year and my mum made all my clothes – I didn’t own a shop-bought dress until I was 14 years old,” the CEO of PIP International says.
“We didn’t have a lot of money but we didn’t feel poor, we were self-reliant and had a great community of friends and family around us.
“My parents always taught me to look outwards to see what help you could offer others.
“I grew up knowing that life’s real pleasure is helping your community.”
Christine, who launched her company in 2019, has always had an entrepreneurial spirit – having set up her own babysitting gig aged just 12.
Then she worked in events before heading to university on a volleyball scholarship to study engineering, which landed her a job as a contract engineering project manager in the food processing industry.
After graduating in 1993 and starting a family, she has since worked for food giants including the companies that make Pepsi and Doritos.
But she knew she wanted something of her own and that’s how her pea protein business was born.
“Plant-based proteins were taking off, so I decided to invest with three business contacts,” she says.
“We each paid $165k (£98k) to secure a secret new technology from a lab in France.
“And by January 2021, I was ready to invest over $5 million (£2.9 million) to buy a former craft beer brewery and turn it into a large demonstration-scale pea-processing factory to test and prove the new technology.
“Fast-forward two years later and peas have taken over my life.
“I dream of peas. I know everything there is to know about peas. People call me the Pea Queen.
“And to this day there are only four of us who know the secret to our recipe.”
Christine and her colleagues chose the yellow pea as it is grown locally and is inexpensive to buy due to its bitter taste.
It has historically been used for animal feed.
By January 2024, Christine hopes to create 45 local jobs at her factory.
The business has also become somewhat of a family affair with Christine’s daughter, Shelby, 23, working in the marketing department and son, Justin, 29, being employed on an affiliated solar farm close by.
Christine is grandmother to a six-year-old girl called Adria Rose and a newborn baby.
“We work hard but even with my big goals in business we are a normal family,” she says.
“We get along and look forward to family games night and long lunches together on the weekend.”
Christine admits to working many 18-hour days and never really takes a day off.
“I’m a grandma and at this point in my life my ‘why’ in business is to leave things in this world better than it was,” she says.
“If I can leave the world a better place, even in a small way, this motivates me more than money ever could.
“Instead of aiming to have millions, I aim to be a disrupter in the food industry.
“I want to be an example to others on how to invest smart in clean technology.”