The story begins...

David and Carmen met in the street.

From there they fell in love, hopped on a plane to London and lived all over the city and travelled all over Europe for close to five years.
David found work as a journalist for BBC World News, after stints with Al Jazeera and Sky News, while Carmen edited business magazines before landing a gig with Southerly, a boutique creative agency.
Life was frantic but fun.

Although something was missing.

The desire to travel kept pulling at them.

So they set off on a 6-month round the world trip that turned into a five year exploration which saw them live in places including the USA, Caribbean, South America, South East Asia and Japan.

And while they kept moving, they discovered what they were looking for - the opportunity to work for themselves.

Carmen and Dave established Red Platypus in 2013.

And as Red Platypus grew, they realised they loved to help businesses tell their stories.

As they travelled and ran a business, many lessons were learned about how to work smarter and lead a balanced life. As a passion project, Carmen and David told their own stories through their blog Double-Barrelled Travel, sharing insights and experiences from the road.

Then a baby came.
They named her Ruby.

They returned home to Perth, Western Australia, where David went to work for Fairfax Media as a senior journalist and Carmen juggled nursing baby Ruby while keeping Red Platypus going part-time.

But life moves fast.

And dreams persist.

So when little Ruby was eighteen months old the family set off on a round Australia caravan trip that lasted nearly two years. They roamed all over, from the red dirt around Uluru to the tip of Cape York and down to Tasmania, working remotely on Red Platypus all the while so as to support their adventures.

Then COVID happened. So back to Perth they went, scraping across the border shortly before lockdown.

They arrived home just in time.

Baby Brontë was born back in Perth. 

The “new normal” took over and other adventures began to brew.

David’s novel, Locust Summer, was published in June 2021 by Fremantle Press. Both he and Carmen are continuing to grow Red Platypus, sharing their skills and experience through online courses, in-person workshops and one-on-one client work.

So that's us. We do things differently.
We pursue our dreams and are driven to help others pursue theirs.

This is our story. What’s yours? We’d love to hear it - and work with you to share it.

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