Attracting high tech talent to the Bay

Posted on 28 May 2019 by Simon Hendery

You’d be hard pressed to describe Hawke’s Bay as New Zealand’s Silicon Valley but Tom Wallace, the founder and CEO of fast-growing local software company Re-Leased, can’t see why it couldn’t be.

Re-Leased is on a mission to double the size of its current team of 60 staff, and that involves doing all it can to attract software developers to the region – even offering them a $5,000 relocation bonus to move here.

“I don’t see any reason why Hawke’s Bay can’t be a really great tech hub,” says Tom, who founded Re-Leased in 2012.

“We’ve got great people, we’ve got a great environment, we’ve got all the technology you need to be able to communicate and work with anyone around the world. Location is no barrier to developing world- beating software.”

Re-Leased sells a cloud-based commercial property management platform – think Xero for landlords, property managers and tenants.

The company is already processing rent transactions worth $500 million a month for clients in 40 countries and it has ambitious growth plans over the next three years, which include opening a US office.

“We want to do it all from the Bay and we need really skilled people who can help us with that,” says Tom.

“We’ve got a great team here at the moment and we want to keep building around that team. We figured there were two options: to bring people in from the outside or train them up internally. We decided to go for a combination of both.”

The company is looking to hire .NET developers, quality assurance and user- experience specialists, as well as filling a range of sales, marketing and operations roles.

To meet its staff growth goals, Re-Leased has allocated $10 million over the next three years for what it’s calling a ‘Homegrown Talent Activation’ campaign – a dual strategy that involves a combination of training aspiring developers from within Hawke’s Bay as well as attracting more experienced people to the region by offering the $5,000 relocation bonus.

At the same time, Re-Leased plans to offer students studying computing at EIT practical experience by supporting the institute’s internship programme. It’s hoping those students will turn out to be a good fit for the company and will move on to becoming permanent staff members.

“In launching a recruitment drive we are sharing what our Napier team already knows – that Hawke’s Bay offers a lifestyle, a working environment and a growing professional ecosystem that can attract and retain the best people to build a global property-technology business,” Tom says.

He believes building that ‘ecosystem’ will produce an upward spiral of IT industry growth for the Bay, which will ultimately deliver a positive payback for Re-Leased.

“The more success we have, the more success other companies will be able to have here, and it will really build up Hawke’s Bay as a [tech industry] destination. It’s about building out the whole ecosystem, because if there’s an ecosystem then we’ll have resources we can tap into as well, and if more strong companies grow alongside us, it’s really going to snowball.”

There’s already plenty of momentum in the local technology sector.

Re-Leased is part of the tech hub cluster of businesses on Ahuriri’s Bridge Street, which includes Xero, NOW, DataNow and several others. That co-location has provided a valuable boost for – and helped build a sense of energy and vibrancy amongst – the players in the tech scene.

Tom believes that if businesses like his can grow staff numbers strongly, it will take that vibrancy to the next level and make it easier to recruit highly skilled staff for Hawke’s Bay roles.

He’s also excited about Re-Leased’s plans to work more closely with EIT, saying there’s a need to fill a gap in the local jobs market, which was evident to him when he left school about a decade ago.

“Previously the options have been to either leave Hawke’s Bay and go to university or stick around and do a trade. There’s another option now: to stay in the Bay, get a great tertiary education and then work on a world- class high-tech project.”

EIT assistant head of schools David Skelton says the institute’s Bachelor of Computing Systems Internship Programme allows industry and education to work together to build our regional capability in IT skills.

“We welcome Re-Leased’s participation, which will offer our students new, valuable experiences,” he says.

Business Hawke’s Bay CEO Carolyn Neville says the company’s Homegrown Talent Activation plans “represent a multimillion- dollar investment in new, well-paid, high-tech jobs that will, in turn, help build the Bay’s reputation for innovation and further diversify our regional economy”.

It’s early days for the Homegrown Talent Activation campaign, which was only launched in late March, but shortly before The Profit went to press, Tom said Re-Leased had been “flooded with inquiries” after announcing the $5,000 relocation bonus. The company was in the process of reviewing a stack of CVs from potential job candidates interested in making the move to the Bay.

An early success for the initiative had been raising the profile of the region among tech industry jobseekers.

“We’ve needed to start making sure there is awareness that there is that option out there. A lot of the time people don’t look for jobs in the Bay because they assume there’s nothing here,” he says.

A company can’t embark on an ambitious expansion strategy without a balance sheet to support it, and Re-Leased is in the fortunate position of having sourced funding to at least get it started on the growth journey it wants to take.

In the middle of last year, the business raised $2.3 million from New Zealand and UK investors in its first external capital round.

It’s a member of the NZTE Focus 700 group of exporters and in 2017 received a Callaghan Innovation Growth Grant to support its research and development efforts.

Tom says given the company’s rapid growth, it will have to raise further capital at some point “but we’re happy with how far we’ve got since last year’s capital-raise. Everything is tracking really well to that plan.”Re-Leased earns more than 70 percent of its revenue from overseas customers, with its highest- growth markets being Australia and the UK.

The more it invests in its skilled development team, the more it will be able to add value to its clients by offering them more high-tech solutions, Tom says.

“We’re making businesses far more efficient, allowing them to grow and we’re solving their problems, so if we can help them do that, we’re obviously adding a lot more value and creating value for ourselves,” he says.

“As we build up new and more sophisticated technology, we can work with much bigger clients too – that’s a natural journey for a software company. We’re working with some really good clients now, which is really exciting.”

It’s an encouraging outlook from a business that’s decided that, while its customer base is global, it’s home will remain in Hawke’s Bay.

Leaving FAWCland for Auckland

Posted on 27 May 2019 by Simon Hendery

Since it began in 2012, F.A.W .C! has become such a drawcard for locals and visitors alike that it’s hard to imagine Hawke’s Bay’s event calendar without it.

But now the woman who established the Food and Wine Challenge – and has nurtured the growth of the twice-a-year celebration of great eating and drinking – has left town.

After more than eight years in charge of Hawke’s Bay Tourism (HBT), general manager Annie Dundas has taken up a new role in Auckland.

But it looks more like a case of ‘see you later’ rather than a final farewell from the industry veteran.

“I’m keeping my house [in the Bay]. I will be back at some point,” she says.

“It was just an amazing opportunity that came up and I feel we’ve done a lot at Hawke’s Bay Tourism and it’s time to hand the mantle on to somebody else to continue the work.”

Aside from fostering F.A.W.C!, that work has included growing a number of other Bay events such as The Big Easy and the Air New Zealand Hawke’s Bay Marathon.

As the media release announcing her departure noted, when Annie started at HBT in 2011, her role involved “rebuilding the credibility of the region’s tourism organisation”. The entity formerly responsible for delivering tourism initiatives, Venture Hawke’s Bay, had imploded following industry and political infighting.

Before arriving here, Annie had spent 17 years with Tourism New Zealand, the last three as regional manager for North America.

Her boss of 10 years, former Tourism New Zealand chief executive George Hickton, was then the newly-appointed chair of Hawke’s Bay Tourism and brought her to the region.

“He asked me to look at what was going on and initially I think I was supposed to be here a month, but I’ve been here eight and a half years, so it all worked out,” she says.

“I wasn’t from Hawke’s Bay and in a funny way I think that might have made it easier. I didn’t know all the politics but I understood what needed to be done.”

Annie’s team devised a plan that local operators supported through a ‘substantial’ contribution of $160,000 a year for three years on top of funding from Hawke’s Bay Regional Council.

“It was a great starting point to have such a strong and unified industry,” she says.

The following year, F.A.W.C! got off the ground.

Annie says while regional tourism organisations such as Hawke’s Bay Tourism generally aren’t in the business of running events, there was a realisation that if the Bay was going to boost visitor numbers it needed ways to draw people here.

“We thought, let’s step in and create something that’s actually going to drive visitors to Hawke’s Bay, rather than just putting an ad in the paper.”

At the time the region was lacking a premium-focused event celebrating the quality of the food and wine Hawke’s Bay has to offer, and that seemed like a missed opportunity, she says.

“I’d worked in the US at the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen, which is held in June each year, and I thought Hawke’s Bay was ripe for the picking for an event with a structure like that.”

After the first Summer F.A.W.C! in late 2012 proved successful, Hawke’s Bay Tourism took the plunge and decided to also run a winter event. It turned out to be a good move – Winter F.A.W.C! now attracts almost as many attendees as its summer counterpart.

“F.A.W.C! is a really special platform for the region and I hope it can continue in its entirety because while it’s two events a year, it’s positioned Hawke’s Bay as a year-round premium food and wine destination,” Annie says.

“Visitors now genuinely come to Hawke’s Bay for a food and wine experience. Sometimes that’s during F.A.W.C! but a lot of the time it’s throughout the rest of the year. We’ve got incredible venues and F.A.W.C! has had a part to play in raising the profile of food and wine generally.”

Similar thinking led to the creation of The Big Easy. Hawke’s Bay has great cycle trails so why not create an event that encourages locals and visitors alike to make use of them?

Asked about other highlights during her time in the role, Annie says she’s proud of the work Hawke’s Bay Tourism has put into its website (HawkesBayNZ.com), which was rewarded with a win at last year’s New Zealand Tourism Awards where it picked up the Industry Alignment Award.

The award was recognition for HBT bringing together the local councils, business associations and over 300 tourism operators to create a single website to promote the region – something Regional Tourism New Zealand executive officer Charlie Ives described at the time as “no easy feat”.

“We’ve worked long and hard on that and we’ve changed a lot of how we operate and run the business based on our digital footprint,” says Annie.

“HawkesBayNZ.com is not just your usual website, it’s a bit more editorially-driven and a bit more newsy. The fact we’ve hit half a million visitors on the site per annum is testament to

the fact people enjoy the content. It’s worked brilliantly for us and the numbers speak for themselves.”

She was able to leave HBT on a high in April with the latest visitor spend figures showing tourists parted with a record $224 million while in the Bay between December and February,

an $8 million increase on what they spent over the same period a year earlier.

On top of that, February’s nine percent growth in spending compared to the same month last year ranked Hawke’s Bay as the best performing region in the country.

Visitor spend in Hawke’s Bay is now estimated at $652 million a year.

But despite the rosy growth and buoyancy in the sector at present, Annie has some words of warning for the region as she begins a new role in Auckland.

“Hawke’s Bay Tourism has got issues around long-term sustainable funding and ultimately we want a sustainable funding model so that we’re not worried about how we market

the region,” she says.

Hawke’s Bay Regional Council cut back its funding of the organisation last year and is now only committed to contributing $1.25 million a year until mid-2021.

HBT is currently working on a regional visitor strategy, including looking at the visitor infrastructure needs for the next 15–20 years, which it hopes all the local councils will buy into.

“There are a whole bunch of bigger issues that need to be planned in Hawke’s Bay around making sure that we’re ready for more visitors and more growth,” Annie says.

“The region needs a much more longer-term view of how it looks at the tourism potential for Hawke’s Bay.”

HBT also needs a bare minimum of the $1.25 million a year it currently gets to carry out its marketing efforts, she says.

“We don’t need it to go back any further. What we have now is borderline to keep promoting the region as we are. That’s why, as a region, we need to think carefully about how we fund stuff,

and if it’s not the ratepayer that faces that burden, then visitors are going to have to face that burden, so we all need to have grown-up conversations around how we do that.”

She cites the example of Queenstown Lakes District Council, which is proposing a visitor levy aimed at raising $25 million to $40 million a year to help fund infrastructure and services.

“I’m sure these conversations will be publicly had in Hawke’s Bay over time. We have to sit back and say, how are we going to pay for all the things we want? We have to have a good open

discussion around how we should do that.”

But while that debate goes on, Annie will be in Auckland where her new role is heading up the tourism arm of iwi entity Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei Whai Rawa Limited, which until now has been

primarily focused on property investments.

“They’ve been very successful in doing what they’ve been doing and now they’re heading into the tourism arena,” she says.

“For me, it’s got some really exciting components to it. Auckland’s at a point where, within a year or two, we’re hosting the America’s Cup and APEC, so it’s a nice time to think about

the message and story we’ll be telling visitors.”

Hawke’s Bay Tourism has appointed a former CEO of Tourism Dunedin, Hamish Saxton, to manage the organisation

temporarily while it recruits a new general manager.

Finding a niche in a large global market

Posted on 10 December 2018 by Simon Hendery

Global and national interest in hemp seed products may be growing but when Kanapu launched into the market, its founders knew they needed to establish a unique selling proposition to ensure success.

At that point, the market was focused on hemp seed oil as a nutraceutical and it was commonly found on the shelves of health stores, particularly in pill form.

But Kanapu co-founder Isaac Beach says at the time there was also growing national and international interest in ‘functional hemp foods’.

“We decided to enter the market from a culinary point of view, focusing on the associated benefits of consuming hemp in the form of a functional food.

“That was a big gap in the market we identified. No one was in that space and yet it was perfect for us because not only is Hawke’s Bay the best part of the country to cultivate industrial hemp, it’s also full of expertise and business support in the area of food. We have some of the nation’s best culinary experts and chefs.

“We partnered with some of them and they came up with these brilliant ways of consuming hemp seed oil, and that led to the community understanding hemp food products are not drugs, they are safe and these expert chefs are using them in their meals at high-end restaurants, in high-end cuisine.”

Among the chefs championing the company’s oil have been Hawke’s Bay’s Kent Baddeley (best known for his restaurant 1024) and Jackson Smith, executive chef at Havelock North’s Malo.

Another aspect of Kanapu’s business strategy has been focusing on supplying the highest-quality product to local markets, given that hemp seed products degrade over time once they’re processed.

“In terms of quality and the realisation of functional benefits of hemp foods, consumers are wanting to consume them within the shortest time since they’ve been processed,” Isaac says.

“We’re better positioned to supply the local market than producers in other countries because of our shorter distance and time to market. We can compete effectively locally, and also in Australia, with regards to providing quality product.

“That, combined with the fact that we’re growing in Hawke’s Bay, is a significant unique point of difference from a quality standpoint.

“Our goal as a company is to focus on functional hemp foods and minimise the distance as much as possible from process to plate, and that’s essentially what we’ve achieved.

“Consumers are raving about the colour, the texture and the taste of our oil versus other oils on the market.”

Growing a market for hemp foods

Posted on 7 December 2018 by Simon Hendery

Having to ramp up your target production because product demand significantly exceeds initial forecasts is one of those business headaches it can be nice to have.

It’s the situation Isaac Beach and Simon White of Otane-based Kanapu Hemp Foods found themselves in this year.

Kanapu has been growing hemp on Otane’s Ludlow Estate, Simon’s family’s farm, and the cold-pressed hemp seed oil they’ve been producing has been in hot demand.

Targeting the premium end of the hemp food market – both locally and internationally – the company is also close to launching a packaged hemp flakes product.

“Following our marketing launch earlier this year, and as a consequence of the response from around the country, we’ve had to adjust some of our forecasting around demand for functional hemp foods in New Zealand,” says Isaac.

“It’s resulted in us increasing our target production for this year (the 2018–19 summer growing season) to around twice what we’d originally intended before the launch.”

The new production target is about 250 hectares of hemp, which the pair admit could be challenging to achieve. It will involve extending production beyond Ludlow Estate, using contract growers across Hawke’s Bay – potentially from Wairoa down to Dannevirke.

The hemp varieties being harvested by Kanapu have zero tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), so are completely non-psychoactive.

They contain about four percent gamma linolenic acid (GLA), a bioactive fatty acid known for its anti-inflammatory qualities, and two to three percent cannabidiol (CBD), which has been shown to be therapeutically useful in treating pain and epilepsy.

Isaac says the company is looking to commence growing trials this season with high CBD hemp varieties, containing 8.5–13 percent CBD.

Hemp production is regulated, meaning Kanapu needs to have its licenses amended in order to achieve its growth plans.

“We’re working with the Ministry of Health to first enable the increase in cultivation area within a short time frame. That process will impact on whether we can meet the target or not,” says Isaac.

“The Ministry have indicated we need to provide justification for the increase, and the justification is that people want to start consuming this product more readily.”

At around 700 hectares, Ludlow Estate is predominantly a mixed-cropping farm. Simon says he became excited about hemp’s potential following an initial meeting with Isaac.

“We’re always looking for new opportunities. And this was a very new opportunity that came to our attention. We researched it and Isaac and I put a three-year plan together. We had targets and key goals within that three-year plan. We achieved all those goals and targets and from there we launched on a commercial scale.”

Simon says a key aspect of the business is that Kanapu is working on a model under which the company controls all aspects of the product, from growing the hemp right through to sale of the product.

“We’re involved in the process the whole way through, which is a key part of making it a successful premium product. That way you’re guaranteeing quality of the product, which is really satisfying,” he says.

“The other thing that’s really hit home recently is the number of testimonials we’ve been receiving from people who’ve been using our product. They’re telling us they’ve been able to stop taking pills [for pain and arthritis] and are instead just using this sustainable product that’s actually helping them.”

Isaac says Kanapu was strongly focused on developing the hemp food industry as a positive economic driver within the Hawke’s Bay region and the Ngati Kahungunu rohe.

“In that regard, we are already establishing relationships with existing cropping farmers to assist in developing this industry because we realise if it’s going to become all that it can be in Hawke’s Bay, it’s going to require a joint effort from multiple farming interests – from the farming side of the value chain

right through to manufacturing, et cetera,” he says.

“From a manufacturing point of view, we’re already positioning ourselves to support that development, and there are some key steps that need to take place between now and this summer’s harvest to enable us to really get a good foot in the door from a national perspective – and even with a view to going international – in terms of establishing Hawkes’ Bay’s potential within this industry.

“We’re almost unashamedly biased to supporting farming interests in Hawke’s Bay, from Wairoa to Dannevirke, and even further south into the Wairarapa region.

“From a business point of view, that’s where we need to focus our energy. If we are to be a region that has a significant competitive advantage in this sector, we need to partner like that. And we need to get all of the expert growers in this region onboard.”

As well as doing what it can to position Hawke’s Bay to take advantage of hemp’s business potential, Kanapu is also helping with efforts to strengthen the industry at a national level.

The company has been at the forefront of the formation of a coalition of businesses involved in the hemp industry.

That entity is called MIHI (Movers in Hemp Innovation) and is focused on identifying opportunities within the sector.

“We’ve identified there is a significant need for government and private sector resources to be dedicated to establishing a sound understanding of the market trends offshore so that we understand as a country where our unique point of difference can be best had,” says Isaac.

“There’s a lot of work that needs to be done to understand the growth of the industry on an international scale but also to understand where, within that global industry of foodstuffs, New Zealand has its unique point of difference. As a coalition partner we’re working towards that in conjunction with government.”

Isaac says the first meeting of MIHI founders was held at Ludlow Estate earlier this year and about 30 companies have now become involved in the grouping.

“Since then we’ve developed a memorandum of understanding and formalised a coalition as a government partner, representing industry in this area.”

Kanapu.co.nz

Art Deco Beer – combining a quality brew with a local identity

Posted on 19 November 2018 by Simon Hendery

When Hawke’s Bay-based beverage company Parkers decided to add a craft beer to its portfolio, it started with a simple objective.

“Our aim was to produce best-in-class beer,” says Parkers founder Doug Speedy.

“Before we considered the branding, our starting point was that the beer had to be good.”

Doug spent about six months researching pilsners and IPAs – the two varieties Deco City Beer launched late last year.

“It involved a lot of tastings of other people’s beers in the quest to find the right flavour profiles. We wanted the profiles to be quite accessible for a craft beer – and not excessively hoppy – so people who were new to craft would find it approachable as well as appealing to seasoned craft beer drinkers who have reached peak hop,” he says.

“We wanted to appeal to the drinkers of mainstream European lagers, to encourage them to move across to craft beer.”

As he worked on developing what would eventually become Deco City Beer, Doug had been talking to Simon Gilbertson, co-founder of Napier contract brewing facility bStudio.

bStudio, a top-end, multimillion-dollar brewery built using state- of-the-art German equipment, opened last year in the old National Tobacco building, which is depicted on Deco City cans.

One of its founding customers was cult Wellington craft brand Garage Project and since opening, the facility has been busy brewing and packaging beers for a range of clients around the country.

Doug says Parkers initially looked at starting its own brewery but decided it made more sense to use bStudio.

“They’ve got the best equipment and the best staff. On a global scale, they’re the best at what they do.”

bStudio has a canning line and the decision was made to produce beer in cans rather than bottles for quality reasons, Doug says.

“Beer keeps better in cans, it’s as simple as that. There’s no light- strike, no oxygen exposure. On top of that, it chills faster and is lighter to carry.”

With flavour profiles and brewing facilities sorted, Doug turned his mind to branding and says the Deco City Beer name was born.

“It was a no-brainer, really. Those of us involved in the company are from Napier. The beer is brewed in the former National Tobacco building, the most photographed art deco building in New Zealand, if not the world.”

But before the naming decision was made, Doug talked to the Art Deco Trust, and those discussions have blossomed into a strong working relationship, which is a win-win for both organisations, he says.

Deco City has become the official beer of the trust’s annual Napier Art Deco Festival.

The brand is now in about 600 retailers around the country and more than 90 per cent of production is sold outside of Hawke’s Bay.

That makes it a strong promotional tool for attracting visitors to the Bay, as well as an ideal brand to have on hand at the trust’s events.

The beer will expand its presence at next February’s festival with a Deco City tent bar being set up near the Marine Parade waterfront. Doug says he plans to partner with other local brewers to showcase Hawke’s Bay craft beer at the event.

By then the Deco City range will have expanded. Doug says a third variety, a pale ale, will be released in time for Christmas.

parkers.kiwi/decocitybeer

Business angels at the ready

Posted on 16 November 2018 by Simon Hendery

Much-needed ‘angel’ funding is beginning to flow into local start-up businesses thanks to a new group that brings entrepreneurs and investors together.

Deals are being done between Hawke’s Bay entrepreneurs and members of a new group established to bring together local investors willing to provide venture capital to early- stage and growth businesses in the region.

The Hawke’s Bay Angel Investment Group (HB Angels) is a network of entrepreneurs and professional investors prepared to collaboratively invest in and support local entrepreneurial talent.

The group has more than 30 members and recently established a board chaired by Havelock North businessman Dean Prebble, a former New Zealand Trade and Enterprise trade commissioner.

Dean has been the driving force behind establishing the investment group, which held its first meeting in November last year.

“There is a tremendous pool of talent in the region and HB Angels will be able to provide capital and support to help those businesses grow and expand,” Dean says.

Other members of the newly-formed board are Jonathan Norman (vice-chair), Rick Cranswick (treasurer), Sharon Chapman and Ailne Bradley.

“The vision of using the private sector to unlock, support and attract fresh entrepreneurial talent to Hawke’s Bay through robust opportunity identification and the building of investment portfolios under a fund structure is a proven model nationally and will benefit the local and regional economy,” Dean says.

To date HB Angels has facilitated relationships with local private equity groups and Manawatu Investment Group (MIG), which has seen a number of early-stage Hawke’s Bay businesses receive time and capital from members.

The group is part of a national association of similar regional organisations – the Angel Association of New Zealand – and would typically make equity investments in businesses of anywhere between $50,000 and $1 million.

Rick, the former chief executive of the region’s largest chartered accounting practice Crowe Horwath, said it was encouraging to see the level of interest shown by both entrepreneurs and investors since the formation of the group.

Its board is made up of people with a broad cross-section of skills that would help the group move forward, he says.

“Entrepreneurship is alive and well in Hawke’s Bay and there is now a place to come to get support and perhaps funding. Importantly, the group works with The Icehouse to help entrepreneurs with businesses needing funding to get investment-ready, so they’ve got a better chance of getting deals over the line.”

Dean says the group’s previous meetings in November, May and August were supported by Napier City Council and were well attended, generating strong interest from potential members.

The New Zealand angel investment community has been going for about 10 years and clubs around the country have a total of about 650 members. Over the past decade, $500 million has been invested into nearly 1,000 deals.

“HB Angels is the 12th club in New Zealand,” Dean says.

“Although Hawke’s Bay has a lot of other groups and entities investing in start-ups, this is the first formalised angel investment group.”

Club members usually meet once every two months and at each event, members can expect between two and four presentations from start-up ventures based either within or outside the region.

Members are able to decide whether, and how much, to invest in any particular deal presented to the club and often several members will invest jointly.

Aside from investing directly through the group’s nominee company, members are also able to take a stake in what would be the group’s first start-up fund – a portfolio of least 10 investments.

This type of portfolio approach improves the risk/return profile of an investment. Given the start-up nature of the type of investments angels are making, long- term returns can range from zero to large multiples of the original investment.

For commercial investments, where several investors are involved in the same deal, the group plans to work closely with MIG, a Palmerston North-based group with a 10- year track record of angel investment.

“We encourage investors to become actively involved in the investment process,” Dean says.

“Opportunities to participate in due diligence and take on a ‘lead investor’ role are available to members, with coaching and support provided to fulfil these roles.”

Katie Nimon takes the wheel

Posted on 16 November 2018 by Simon Hendery

Katie Nimon has been working in her family business – Nimon Luxury Passenger Transport – since she was 14. Now she’s been recognised as a leading influencer for Hawke’s Bay tourism.

When this year’s Hawke’s Bay Tourism Awards were announced in September, Katie Nimon was honoured with a special individual accolade that seems very appropriate: Ambassador for Tourism in Hawke’s Bay.

It’s a reflection of more than just of her role as a key player in the local tourism industry; she’s been championing the Bay for years.

“When I was working in advertising in Auckland (about three years ago), my workmates used to joke about me being the ambassador for Hawke’s Bay,” she chuckles.

“Back then I used to talk about Hawke’s Bay so much – telling everyone to pay it a visit, how it was a great place to go on holiday, or just for a weekend – maybe they foresaw the award, I don’t know!”

In January this year, Katie was appointed general manager of the family business, Nimon Luxury Passenger Transport, where she works with her father and managing director Bill Nimon, mother Sue (administration manager) and uncle Garth Nimon, who looks after the company’s school runs.

Katie, 27, is the fifth generation of the Nimon family to work in the business and she’s been part of the company since she became a part- time staffer at the age of 14.

“I definitely started at the bottom. I was spending most of my time answering phones, filing paperwork and stamping envelopes. Basically, doing everything that no one else wanted to do.”

After leaving school, she studied advertising and marketing at Massey University, finishing with an Honours degree. But the family business has never been far from her mind.

“When I was 18, before I went off to university, I redesigned the logo to what it is now,” she says.

“Then, during my time at university, any free time I had – holidays and the odd weekend – would be spent working in the business, learning every single role that we have. I was doing the charter work, some marketing and PR, covering accounts when people were away, looking after operations.

“That was probably the best learning experience I could have. During that time, we were slowly starting to refine the brand and polish up what the business actually means, so I was effectively working on the brand identity that whole time.”

After completing her studies and spending time working in Auckland, Katie headed back to Hawke’s Bay in 2015 to take up the role as marketing manager at Nimons (as it is fondly known).

“The sunshine called and I followed,” she says.

“When I was younger I’d always wanted to work in advertising, and that’s what I studied and had the opportunity to do, and it was amazing; but the more time I spent away from Hawke’s Bay and away from the family business, the more I realised that was what I wanted to do.”

Then, in January this year, she became general manager, replacing long-serving GM Pete Patterson who had moved on.

“We looked at it and thought, yes, okay, I’m young, but on the other hand, who knows the business as well as I do?”

As general manager Katie retains the marketing role, which she says makes sense because it’s a business where marketing is at the core of what the company does.

“Everybody should be thinking with a marketing mindset, so it made sense that I continue doing what I was doing as marketing manager. In this industry the role is about marketing ourselves and the region as well as about relationship building.

“What’s really important is that you have good relationships with other operators and venues and members of the public. If other businesses don’t believe in what you do, then no amount of marketing is going to help because they are the advocates – they’re the ones who suggest to their customers that they should use your services.”

If taking up the GM role wasn’t enough, Katie is also back studying extramurally, working towards an MBA through Massey University.

While it’s keeping her very busy, she says she’s enjoying complementing what she’s learning through practical work in the business with what the MBA is teaching her.

Over the past three years, and following on from the earlier rebranding work, Katie’s work in the business has included introducing the Nimon Luxury Passenger Transport brand.

While not all aspects of the business are focused on ‘luxury’, she says the branding reflects the fact that a large portion of its operations is focused on the higher end of the market.

It’s a positioning Bill first identified when he realised several years ago that vehicles with high specifications were what the industry was demanding, and what could set Nimons apart.

“We had competitors in the region doing the ‘basic’ approach, and even though at the time there wasn’t a lot of high-end tourism, that’s changed and the arrival of destinations such as The Farm at Cape Kidnappers have brought a different type of business to Hawke’s Bay,” she says.

“Likewise, with the arrival of high-end cruise ships and growth in the number of touring groups and individual travellers looking for a top-quality experience, we’ve been ready for that change in the market, rather than waiting for it to happen and then responding to it.”

But Katie says the business – and the tourism industry in general – can’t afford to focus solely on high-end travellers.

“I think there’s a place for every kind of business and every kind of offering. We talk to people regularly who want our advice on how to get into the cruise market or tourism in general and we tell them the most important thing is offering something for everybody.

“We’re very aware that we’re not in Auckland, where you might be able to be top-end-only and still be successful. But if we only offered top-end services here, we wouldn’t be busy all the time.

“I was recently talking to a new operator who was interested in targeting the top end and I told him you don’t want to discount the backpackers because they still have money to spend, albeit not as much.

“It doesn’t mean that everybody shouldn’t offer quality and I think that’s completely different. If you are offering an affordable, accessible product, it still needs to be high quality, it just might not have all the bells and whistles that a top operator might have.”

She says the industry should always have in the back of its mind that today’s backpackers and freedom campers could potentially return to New Zealand as tomorrow’s luxury travellers.

Cruise ship passengers, who might only spend a few hours in the region, should also be thought of in the same way.

“People on cruises might be here for six hours. It’s not long and often they don’t spend much money in the region, but we’re here to put our best foot forward and give them a great experience. Then they’ll come back, bring their families and stay for a week – that’s what we want and that’s our opportunity.

“That’s how we’ve got to treat any visitor – the potential for more. A backpacker may come here freedom camping but in 10 years’ time, when they’ve got money to burn, they might come back and stay in luxury accommodation.”

One of the challenges for Nimons, she says, is it represents two industries – transport and tourism – which often have conflicting requirements.

“The thing is not to put yourself in one box, because if we had put ourselves only in the transport industry box we wouldn’t have even considered the possibility of seeking Qualmark Gold certification. But because we’re also a tourism operator and we see the value of respecting and protecting the environment and making sure we are role models for our visitors, we went for it.

“We tried really hard to offset our carbon footprint and we achieved Qualmark Gold status. As a tourism operator that’s not uncommon but as a transport operator, it is. We’re one of only two coach companies in the country to achieve it.”

Nimons is a business where there’s a constant need to ensure the customer experience is unique, says Katie.

“It’s the personality of the driver and that feeling that customers have when they get onboard one of our vehicles. That’s what you’ve got to keep in mind every day. It’s more than just getting someone from one place to the next – because anyone can do that – it’s what you can do differently.

“The most important thing is thinking more about the experience than the product. The product is the bus and the experience is what you do with it. You can have the world’s nicest, most modern vehicle but if you’ve not got the entirety of the service at that same level, it’s not going to be a complete experience.”

Nimons.co.nz

Growing a market for hemp foods in HB

Posted on 16 November 2018 by Simon Hendery

Chefs and foodies have been quick to develop a taste for Otane-based Kanapu’s premium cold-pressed hemp seed oil. But that’s just the beginning. The company’s founders want to put Hawke’s Bay on the map as a global supplier of top-end hemp foods.