In a historic corner of Dunedin, startup culture is thriving. Catherine McGregor visited the city’s Warehouse Precinct to meet the people driving the movement. When Jason and Kate Lindsey bought the four storey building now known as Petridish, it was an absolute wreck. Once home to a thriving hat and textiles factory – a 1919 … Read more
Rohan Hill and Ian Jorgensen are having so much fun running their boutique audio equipment firm that no amount of money could make them sell. Wellington electronics manufacturer Synthstrom Audible can only just keep up with demand for its flagship product. Engineer and musician Rohan Hill developed the portable Deluge synth/sequencer/sampler – “in my bedroom, … Read more
Fruit are ovaries, and when Wā Collective founder and executive menstruator Olie Body asked Michelle O to feel her cherries the former first lady dived right in. Who would have thought I’d meet Michelle Obama in my old yoga pants, the ones I’ve sewn up at the crotch multiple times, the ones with some pink … Read more
Kiwi startup founder Jenene Crossan has spent two years enduring jetlag and heinous London Airbnb prices as she builds her latest business. Jenene Crossan, co-founder and CEO of beauty booking service Flossie, has spent most of the past two years sitting in airport lounges and living out of suitcases in a bid to launch Flossie’s offshoot, … Read more
As controversy including a $10m lawsuit and ‘ghost’ offices continues to swirl around Jamie Beaton, his fellow Rhodes scholars have slammed him for trying to recruit them. Those who gain a prestigious Rhodes Scholarship must display “truth, courage, devotion to duty, sympathy for and protection of the weak, kindliness, unselfishness and fellowship”. Given this ethos … Read more
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand. This week he talks to Jodie Fox, co-founder of Shoes of Prey. For many years, this week’s podcast guest executed every move from … Read more
Rapidly growing Northland startup North Drill believes in making a profit so that it can hire more people and provide a better life for their whānau. Business editor Maria Slade reports. Ida-Jean and Bronson Murray are buying homes in Whangārei. In a region where prices are up over 9% for the year, there’s nothing revolutionary … Read more
Happy Cow Milk is poised to relaunch with a new business model and an invention that could revolutionise dairy production, explains founder Glen Herud, in the latest instalment of his Spinoff series documenting the company’s fall and rise again. Just as we were chilling the beers for our equity crowdfunding launch last Thursday we crossed … Read more
Newly launched carbon offsetting company CarbonClick want to make it easier for businesses and consumers to save the planet. CEO Dave Rouse and CPO Jan Czaplicki explain that while carbon offsetting isn’t the solution to global warming, it’s necessary. We have pumped our skies full of greenhouse gases for over 200 years, resulting in an … Read more
There’s an innovation renaissance brewing in post-earthquake Christchurch as multicultural entrepreneurship replaces the old boys’ network. This required a new name, writes Steven Moe. An unusual name that evokes images from Harry Potter is fine by the Ministry of Awesome, because it immediately sets it apart. Founded in the aftermath of the Canterbury earthquakes, the … Read more
They might be on the pricier side but books editor Catherine Woulfe is feeling much better using startup Little & Brave’s compostable nappies to deal with her daughter’s epic poos. Our daughter is a champion shitter. From day one she had an innate sense of timing: we’d place her on high on the change table, … Read more
Longed for stirrings in the local investment sector are a positive sign that New Zealand businesses may be able to keep calling Aotearoa home. What do hydrofoiling freight boats, chicken-free chicken and a customer feedback platform have in common? Not much, except that they are the first Kiwi businesses to be backed by Australian investor … Read more
One startup was banned by the government. Another founder was thrown in prison. Duncan Greive describes what he found on two trips to Asia earlier this year. The moment I realised where I really was is etched into my mind. Kirsten Han, the editor-in-chief of New Naratif, was explaining the constraints under which her news … Read more
In our Q&A series, The Lightbulb, we ask innovators and entrepreneurs to tell us about how they turned their ideas into reality. This week we talk to Honeywrap co-founder Tara McQuinn, makers of organic fabric beeswax wraps. First of all, give us your elevator pitch for Honeywrap. Honeywrap is a beeswax wrap made with organic cotton. … Read more
The Hi-Tech Awards are fast approaching, but who’ll be deemed the most innovative of them all? We take a closer look at the five nominees for Kiwibank’s Most Innovative Hi-Tech Service award. Eleven billion dollars: that’s how much revenue New Zealand’s leading hi-tech companies brought into our economy last year. That’s an 11% increase from … Read more
Wellington-based startup Again Again has big plans for the way you do takeaways. Have you got a keep cup? Oh you do? Neat. Where is it? Oh you don’t know? Probably at home? Maybe at work? Maybe in the car? So not with you when you went to get your takeaway flat white this morning, … Read more
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand, with the interview available as both audio and a transcribed excerpt. Connections can be the difference between a venture taking off or stalling. … Read more
If commentators are reading the tea leaves right, the government is gearing up to put its money where its mouth is and help businesses caught in New Zealand’s infamous funding gap. Lisa Friis doesn’t strike you as the sort of woman who needs help getting in front of potential investors. Tall, with a stylish blonde … Read more
Allowing overseas money to pour in and fill the gap left by a dearth of New Zealand investors is robbing us of employment opportunities and valuable tax revenue, Bill O’Boyle writes. Anyone who’s spent time around the Kiwi startup scene knows that one of the biggest challenges facing our fledgling businesses is the dreaded ‘funding … Read more
Researching ancestry is a spiritual matter for Māori, and platforms like ancestry.com just don’t cut it. Ahau, a Māori-led startup, believes the mysterious technology of blockchain holds the answer. Dan Walker was a bit nervous when he put his great-great-great grandfather Tuwhakaruru Katene into ancestry.com. Tuwhakaruru lived through some of the hardest years of colonisation for … Read more
Business is Boring is a weekly podcast series presented by The Spinoff in association with Callaghan Innovation. Host Simon Pound speaks with innovators and commentators focused on the future of New Zealand, with the interview available as both audio and a transcribed excerpt. This week: men’s clothing subscription company Asuwere. Dollar Shave Club, My Food … Read more
Bex de Prospo went from running music venues to spruiking ants and locusts to the country’s best restaurants. Now, after three years of trying to make a difference, she explains why Christchurch startup Anteater is shutting its doors. As we stood, evicted, on the side of a remote road in Cambodia, watching our tuk tuk … Read more
Every week on The Primer we ask a local business or product to introduce themselves in eight simple takes. This week we talk to James Koo, co-founder of student discount and job listings app Niesh. ONE: How did Niesh start and what was the inspiration behind it? Niesh actually started as a project between me and … Read more
Every week on The Primer we ask a local business or product to introduce themselves in eight simple takes. This week we talk to brand strategist James Hurman whose latest venture, Storytech, wants to help small businesses work out their elevator pitch in a single day. ONE: How did Storytech start and what was the inspiration behind … Read more
He’s 23 years old and runs a $9 million video company that interviews successful business leaders and then posts them online. Who is Unfiltered co-founder Jake Millar? And what even is Unfiltered? “Who’s got a couple of thousand dollars to spare?” One hand, two hands, three hands go up – for a Dick Frizzell, a … Read more
A graduate of a women-only startup incubator is using crowdsourcing to gather usable data about patterns of sexual assault. Whereas once the female of the species was expected to deal with ‘creepy’ behaviour from men as best she could, the #metoo movement has empowered women to speak out about sexual harassment and violence in our … Read more
Kiwis need to get over their cultural bashfulness and start faking it until they make it, businesses were told at Australasia’s first ‘Startup Grind’. Guy Kawasaki looks at me as if I’m a bit simple. I have just asked the corporate ‘evangelist’, speaker, author of 13 books and former Apple Mackintosh marketer whether New Zealand … Read more
Every week on The Primer we ask a local business or product to introduce themselves in eight simple takes. This week we talk to Adrian Wills, founder of Trickle, which manages every aspect of a beer’s life cycle and flow from keg to customer. ONE: How did Trickle start and what was the inspiration behind it? I got involved … Read more
She’s the founder and CEO of beauty-booking app Flossie, controls the agency for social media influencers and sits on the board of Kiwisaver darling Simplicity. So why did Jenene Crossan hit rock bottom? Content warning: this post contains discussion of suicide and suicidal thoughts. I’d been keeping my powder dry on writing this. But today, having … Read more