Western Sydney Is Treating Acai Like It’s Premium Cocaine

Painted with an Instagram-ready assortment of fruit, the Western Sydney acai craze possesses a feverish mania that involves people talking about the purple sludge like it's a bag of coke and lining up for half an hour just for a single scoop. In a lot of ways, coke might be quicker to get your hands on at the moment.

This all comes at least 7 years after Sydney’s East and North first got a taste for acai. Back when Kendall Jenner was saving racism with a Pepsi can and the Australian government poked their noses into same-sex couples’ business (again), acai bowls kept people living, laughing and loving. 

But the tanned, bikini-clad rich kids and Gorman-wearing mums of the Other Side of Sydney are no longer the target acai audience. Now, it’s all Western Sydney.


Acai is a Brazilian superfood known for its many health benefits, gaining popularity in Sydney’s beachside breakfast spots throughout 2017. It made for an easy, light alternative to your ordinary sweet breakfast, and above all, it was pretty.

Several years after its initial boom, the acai contagion has finally reached the West, and people are going crazy for it.

If you frequent The Area often you know that there is a consistently busy, late-night acai bar in almost every suburb. If you don’t frequent The Area often, your one Western Sydney mate will know the exact trading hours and location of every acai bar within a 5km radius. Yes, it’s that serious.

I never really saw this phenomenon until a friend of mine told me about seeing a Guildford acai bar filled to the door with Nike Dri-Fit, TN-wearing locals.

I even visited my go-to fried chicken spot in Mount Druitt one night and noticed an abnormally long line of customers for a weekday. They were there for one thing only: their newly added acai bowls.

My first thought: Why the fuck is a fried chicken shop selling acai?

And my second thought: Why does everyone want it so bad?

TikTok has become a breeding ground for Western Sydneysiders to share their fixation and spread the word about where to get their hit.

Habibi Juice in Blacktown is one of many go-to spots and has posted multiple videos of customers lining outside the shopfront and down the street night after night for their acai. Acai World in Guildford serves customers even past their closing time of 1 AM because of the high demand. The same can be said for Thirsty Monkey, who took their acai to the CBD of Western Sydney, Parramatta. In one video, workers show 59 empty 10kg buckets of acai, fulfilling 782 orders in one day of trade.

“When we first started we were closing at 5 PM,” Thirsty Monkey founder Jacob Najjar told SmartCompany.

“Before we knew it, people were still lining up till 6 o’clock trying to get in, and we were not leaving till 7:30 PM to 8 PM,”

“Then we changed it to 10 PM, and that’s when the dynamic changed.”

Speaking about the logistics of acai-making and selling, a man named Allan Assaad uploaded a now-viral video of himself discussing everything from the weight of the acai to the quality, texture and supply, even down to the specific amount of grams used to perfect the acai concoction. He talks about it with so much passion and intrigue, that you’d think he’s pushing fine Columbian snow.

Even big restaurant chains like Rashays have added acai to their Mount Annan menu, looking for a shot at the acai game to satisfy the cravings of their local community. 

While everyone acknowledges that the acai boom is well and truly booming out West, no one seems to know why.

The future of the craze is unpredictable, and Western Sydneysiders are already calling potato trucks as the next “new” food trend to take over.

But for now, the acai bowl reins supreme.


Adele is the Junior Writer & Producer for VICE AU/NZ. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter here.