User:MatthewDalhousie/Tim Efkarpidis

Anastasios "Tim" Efkarpidis  (born 10 March 1944) is a Greek-born Australian businessman. One of many post-war New Australians who enjoyed success as food entrepreneur, he is known for building and running several supermarket chains in the Canberra area. In his later career, he moved his business to high-end residential and commercial property development, including the NewActon Precinct in the inner north of Canberra, described as "the most ambitious design property in Australia."

Early life and education
Efkarpidis was born in Katerini, Thessaloniki, during the German occupation of Greece. His mother and father, who were ethnically Russian, had left Odesa to find refuge in the part of Northern Greece. Both his parents died in the war years. Cared for by his older brother, Theophilos, he remained at school in Katerini to complete his matriculation. His brother left Greece for Australia in the summer of 1962.

Travelling alone, and speaking no English, Efkarpidis made the voyage to Sydney a year later, on the Patris. Arriving on 29 August 1963, he travelled inland, to the central western town of Forbes, to work with his brother at the Wattle Café.

Here, Anastasios took the Australian nickname "Tim" and his brother Theophilos become known as "Tom." While working at the café, he met Maria Constantinou, whose family had emigrated to the town from the Greek island of Rhodes. Tim and his brother began discussing a food and beverage business of their own, only in the growing Australian capital city of Canberra—whose population would triple in size during the 1960s.

Career
Efkarpidis began work in Canberra as a house painter and decorator during the day with the Besselink company; while working nights as an oyster shucker for the Seven Seas Fishery. With his savings, he began his first business with his brother in 1965: Curtin Fresh Fish and Cooked Supply.

The business partnership would endure his brother's death. Three years after starting the fish shop, they purchased a mini market and two blocks of land in the suburb of Higgins. It was the one occasion the partnership extended to a partner outside the Efkarpidis family, with the businessman Philipos Christodoulou. Two years after the land purchas in Higgins, Efkarpidis built what would be the first of his many supermarkets.

The business delivered strong returns, and Efkarpidis went into partnership with his brother to purchase a supermarket in Chapman in 1973. From there they purchased the entire shopping complex known as Southlands in Mawson, which included his first Shop-Rite supermarket; a brand he would later extend. The supermarkets were popular with Canberrans, known for being clean and friendly, with long opening hours. With both his brother and Christodoulou, he added to his portfolio a supermarkets in Kippax, Erindale, and Yarralumla; the group's first Cannon’s Quality Fresh, in Fyshwick, along with the Belconnen fruit markets.

Efkarpidis and his brother showed "enormous energy" and stayed directly involved in the running of the supermarket businesses. Their children worked at the supermarkets, cleaning aisles, stacking the shelves, and carrying customer's shopping to their cars.

The Warehouse Group
Eventually, the brothers would own 30 supermarket businesses, including the Shop-Rite, Supabarn and Cannons Quality Fresh. Their first property purchase in the CBD was the heritage listed Melbourne Building. However, the most important accomplishment of the two brothers, "by far" was their response to being edged out of the market by the large duopoly of Coles and Woolworths.

Under pressure from Coles and Woolworths, many wholesale suppliers would refused to provide the brothers with stock. The ACT Government responded to lobbying, and sold the brothers a land package which would become a large warehouse and distribution hub. This gave their own supermarkets, and many other independent supermarkets owned by Greek Australians, a single buying block, significantly improving their margins. Branded the Warehouse Group, it would later be described as “the most successful business in Australia.”

Molonglo Group
Efkarpidis divested from these interests for $86 million in 1996. He took the funds to create a new company, which brought in his two sons, Jonathan and Nektar. Molonglo Group has focused on large property developments, beginning in Canberra. As of 2013 Efkarpidis senior was still listed as a director of the company.

The company's first development was the NewActon precinct, a former government building site, commencing in 1997. The precinct covers an area of over 2,000m2 on the fringe of Canberra's Parliamentary Triangle, and took 14 years to complete, with Efkarpidis encouraging his sons to drive the project. Having hired the architecture firm Fender Katsalidis, the development would eventually included medium rise appartments, an 800-seat cinema for Palace Cinemas, and the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water building. The precinct's hotel, now known as Ovolo Nishi, features a staircase built from 2,250 pieces of salvaged timber. Efkarpidis chose to back Japanese architects for many aspect of the build as they "know how to build more functional space." The buildings and common spaces were designed to encourage walking, and feature a large number of public artworks, following "the patriarch's" belief that "art is meant to be shared and not held in the rarefied environment of boardrooms or homes of the wealthy."

The New York Times would later describe Molonglo's development as giving Canberra a "decidedly hipster underbelly." The precinct, including NewActon Hotel Hotel, won many awards for the family including:


 * Walter Burley Griffin Award for Urban Design in 2015 by the Australian Institute of Architects.
 * Australian Institute of Architects ACT Awards, Sydney Ancher Award for Residential Architecture, 2017
 * Building Awards (United Kingdom), International Project of the Year, 2015
 * Australian Institute of Architects’ 2015 ACT Architecture Awards

Having completed this civic project, Efkarpidis' attention turned to Molonglo's Dairy Road project, between the industrial suburb of Fyshwick and the protected Jerrabomberra Wetlands. It is described as being the next iteration of the family's "vision for Canberra", an intersection of nature and the built environment.

Personal life
Efkarpidis married his teenage sweetheart, Maria, at St Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church in Kingston on 22 August 1971. The marriage brought them two sons, Nectarios (known as Nektar) and Ionathan (known as Johnnathan) who are partners in their father's business.

Having moving to Canberra, Efkarpidis has never lived anywhere else. He and his Maria did buy the historic harbour-front property Chiltern in Darling Point Sydney, originally been built by the founder of Woolworths Supermarkets. However, the couple sold the property a short while later, having never moved in. The couple reside today in Canberra's inner south suburb of Red Hill.

Honours
In the 2010 Queen's Birthday Honours, Efkarpidis was awarded the Order of Australia Medal for services to business through the retail and construction sectors.

Philanthropy
Efkarpidis is a Greek Orthodox Christian. He supports several concerns related to the local church community, Greek community club and global Greek diaspora, including, the Greek Orthodox Community of Canberra and the global Hellenic Initiative. He, his company, and his family have been patrons to the arts in Canberra, which has included the festival Art, Not Apart, the National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery of Australia