Business Is Boring

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 James Bartle, founder of ethical clothing brand Outland Denim.This week on the podcast we talk to a man inspired to take on trafficking after watching the Liam Neeson film Taken. His journey led him to Cambodia to set up a factory, train staff, pioneer environmental production techniques and to today run one of the world’s fastest growing premium sustainability fashion brands.Right now, more likely than not, you are wearing something that you're not super proud of. All of us know that if we are in a piece that was a bargain at a fast fashion store or from a mass market brand that, chances are, the labour, fabric or environmental footprint is probably not up to scratch. Clothing production is one of the biggest industries in the world and it has a hugely harmful social and economic impact. Most people know more about the living standards of the chickens that make their eggs than the workers that make their clothes.But what happens when one person starts trying to do something about it?Today's guest's journey of learning about trafficking, labour exploitation and environmental impact led him to set up a factory in Cambodia, get B Corp status and change expectations around how denim can be produced with his company, is Outland Denim.It had a huge wave of publicity last year after the Duchess of Sussex wore a pair of the brand's jeans, leading to more than 40 new workers being added to the company.Founder James Bartle was in Auckland launching a new line this week with Karen Walker - a collaboration including t-shirts, jackets, jeans and skirts made with signature Karen Walker elements, by Outland’s own team in Cambodia, using organic cotton and dyes.Bartle joined Business is Boring to chat the journey, the mission and what we don't really know about the clothes we wear. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Campbell Brown, CEO of the company making sure Domino's has enough dough. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Kiri Nathan, the co-founder of a Māori-inspired fashion brand that's been gifted to some of the world's biggest names.Today we talk to Kiri Nathan, leader of a brand and company by her own name that fuses millennia of Māori tradition with an industry so often focused on the future.Kiri Nathan's pounamu, carved by her husband and business partner Jason, and her woven kākahu cloaks have been gifted to visitors from Barack Obama to the Duchess of Sussex. Both are part of their unique offering, contemporary pieces that represent the modern fashion world but with their roots in te ao Māori.It is a concept that she's had to forge room for, but she's succeeded through determination, talent and dedication. And she's not forgotten to carve the path out for those who wish to follow her journey. Kiri has created the Kāhui Collective – a group fostering collaboration and knowledge-sharing to create a uniquely Māori fashion industry.The group has had scores of designers involved, they’ve taken trips to China as part of their development programme, and in the latest in a long line of awards and recognition for her pioneering work Kiri is a recent recipient of a Blake Leadership Award.To talk her journey, how she's making fashion work in positive ways, and what’s next, Kiri Nathan joined Business is Boring for a chat. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Brianne West, founder of Ethique.On the podcast this week we have an amazing guest, one of the most successful companies to come out of the local high-growth ecosystem, now exporting their idea all around the world.Ethique are one of the best investments local venture experts the Icehouse has made, and they aren't even a traditional tech or widget maker. They sell soaps and shampoos and things that would come in wet form in plastic, except in dry form in cardboard. Ethique founder Brianne West joined us to discuss the novel approach to a problem right in front of everyone every day, but one that took her fresh approach to see.Because we are pretty funny animals, us humans.  Some people see problems and do things about them, and others do weird things.Take supermarket plastic bags. The problem with plastic bags is that plastic lasts for generations, degrades into micro plastics, and poisons the food chain and soil. So the answer we found to that problem? Ban thin plastic bags and make an absolute shit-tone more, thicker plastic bags, that have all the same problems as thin plastic bags, except more so. Good work humans. And then, as I’m sure you’ve all noticed, you get your shopping home and every product has five layers of rarely recyclable plastic.One person who looked at the problem of plastic and packaging and did something wildly clever about it is our guest this week. In 2012 Brianne West, a scientist, became a kitchen chemist when she had a eureka moment in the shower that selling liquid soap packaged in thick plastic was probably not the best way to do things. She created hard soaps in paper and compostable packaging. Her shampoo bars, soaps and conditioners have become fan favourites. Through a couple of wildly successful crowd-funds, product development, opening up large retail channels in the US, Australia and further afield, Brianne and Ethique have created millions of fans and stopped millions of plastic bottles going to landfill.It is a great pleasure to have someone who’s mission and execution are an inspiration to me join the show. To talk the insight, making it happen and what’s next, Brianne West of Ethique joined us for a half hour chat you can hear below. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Shaun Edlin, CEO of Dotterel, and Richard Quin, Callaghan Innovation Group Manager.This week’s podcast is a bit different, we’re going to be hearing from an entrepreneur about their company and journey - and also from the people behind the C-Prize, a competition that our entrepreneur’s company Dotterel took part in that’s helped take their innovations to the world. Dotterel are a drone noise reduction company, they make technology that means drones don’t drone so much - allowing for things like stealth defence work and screen industry audio recording. CEO Shaun Edlin joined us to talk about how the C-Prize helped spur them on, and open up new markets.The C-Prize challenges New Zealand innovators to use new technologies to tackle complex global problems with creativity and inventiveness, is open to New Zealand innovators and comes with a great big cash reward and support component. And this year the prize is now open to anyone with an idea that could make a difference in solving environmental challenges. Ten finalists are picked and mentored through a programme, with one taking out the award. To learn more about how it works and how you can enter, Richard Quin, Callaghan Innovation Group Manager joined us with the full story with Sean from Dotterel. Listen below and find out more about the C-Prize here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Ian Taylor, founder of of Animation Research Ltd.This week on Business is Boring we have Ian Taylor - a man who has used science and technology to tell new stories in sport, movies and culture. His company Animation Research Limited has pioneered graphics that became world famous with the America’s Cup, and he has now set out to tell one of the great, barely-told stories of New Zealand. New Zealand Aotearoa has one of the world’s most amazing stories of navigation and exploration, yet for years when it was taught it was only Cook and Tasman named as our discoverers. Kupe has long been written off as a story, a Maori 'legend', and the seafaring feats of journeying across the ocean of the first people of New Zealand were labelled an accident.Everyone has heard of Cook. How many know that great navigator only got his way in and out of trouble across the Pacific with the aid of Tupaia, a Tahitian navigator who he picked up along the way to help the Endeavour find its way here, and help with translating the Maori language to Cook and his men? Who really knew how murderous Cook’s first visit was, his crew killing people all around the country?We’ve failed to tell the stories that didn’t make the Pākehā expedition look good. But the tide is now turning.Recently the government announced the history of Aotearoa's colonisation and the Land Wars will now be widely taught in schools, and Ian Taylor has been working to bring information about New Zealand's true discovery, by the Polynesian navigators, to life.Taylor's company Animation Research Limited, from Dunedin, has grown to become the world leader in sports graphics. If you’ve seen an America’s Cup race, watched a game of golf or cricket, you'd have seen his tech. As pioneers in computer graphics, Animation Research Limited were responsible for everything from the dancing Bluebird Penguin ad to Hollywood scenes and everything in-between. Ian Taylor is leading the team, and winning gongs for innovating, but has now also turned his eye to making sure we all know our history so we can build from it, with his project the voyage.co.nz.To talk the journey, our stories and what’s next, Ian joined the podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Tim Brown, Co-founder of AllBirds.This weeks’ podcast has an extra special guest that has recently been on the minds, and feet, of people all around the world.It was a great chance to talk about a journey from New Zealand to the very top of the fashion industry, and Allbirds co-CEO Tim Brown turned up for an honest, engaging and helpful chat about what it takes to build something different, and what it takes personally and professionally to keep stepping up in terms of scale and expectations.It’s a story now famous in Aotearoa. A few short years ago a New Zealand professional footballer has a dream for a shoe made out of wool, and lots of our podcast listeners will have followed every step along the way.For many that first moment might have been seeing a Former All White fronting a Kickstarter project with the great overview video for a new merino wool shoe you could wear without socks. From there this Allbirds idea has grown and grown through the first signs that this little concept from New Zealand was getting worldwide notice, through to investment, great media notices, huge sales, and AllBirds stores opening up in the world’s great retail areas, and now, a store in Auckland.Although success can make things seem like it was a sure bet, it was, in the words of the founder and today’s guest, ‘a bad idea for a long time before it was a good one’. To find out how bad idea can turn into something quite wonderful, to chat the journey to here, and to hear what’s next, Allbirds founder Tim Brown joined the podcast you can find just below. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Erik Zydervelt, Founding Director and CEO of Mevo.This week the Business is Boring Podcast chats to the founder of a revolutionary new ride share program, prominent in Wellington and with big plans. It’s the future, it’s electric, it’s the vibe, it’s Mevo. This is an interesting one. In a few years people will probably be looking back and thinking it was absolutely bananas how many people had cars, and how little they used them.If you think about it, having an asset that you use less than an hour a day, yet where you are responsible for every bit of depreciation, servicing, insurance, risk and upkeep, well it doesn’t seem the brightest model. And as cities begin to price in all the free space they are given in the form of road parking; as automation advances; and as urban density increases; the days of every family having 2 cars are looking pretty much numbered. But the thing is, cars can be really handy, and although you may not be best to own one, having access to them can be a real win. So around the world car-share services, and car on-demand services are springing up, and in Wellington, New Zealand, a particularly interesting home-grown one is in operation.Mevo allows users to open an app, find a near-by plug-in hybrid Audi, unlock it with their phone, hire it by the hour, and then when finished, park it in any metered park in most of Wellington central so long as it is run by the council. And then you just walk away. It’s the convenience of a Lime scooter, except sanctioned by councils and cutting down road clutter instead of adding to it. The idea has launched with some impressive backers on the board, and with investment from Z and Audi NZ and with a novel carbon positive approach to offsetting emissions - they sequester 120% of what you make, and into rainforests that will actually retain the carbon. It’s a cool idea, with thousands of users, many ditching their cars, and it is becoming part of the transport mix in Wellington. To talk the journey, where it could go from here, and what transport might look like into the future, Erik Zydervelt joined the podcast, that you can find below. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Hamish Pinkham, founder and creative director of R & VThis week’s podcast tells the story of how a few mates turned a party for friends into one of the biggest events in New Zealand. There is a lot that is unlikely about the story: the people, the place, the success…. and it was never assured. It’s taken a lot of risk, determination, wrong turns and hard times to make R & V such an event that for you to know it all we have to say is its initials.In 2003 a group of mates threw a party for 400 people in a vineyard in Gisborne. 2000 people came and it began what has become a festival that is famous on the world stage and a rite of passage for kiwi youth. Rhythm and Vines grew and grew. From small beginnings they added days to the event, Internationals, camping, comedy and a whole roster of other ticketed events they promoted. But they grew a bit far a bit fast and some of the things that made the festival feel special were lost. After what was called a riot in their secondary campground they went back to basics, and have rebuilt the festival into a safer, friendlier, smaller and more curated affair. There have been highs and lows, big wins and financial losses, and last year news came that our guest this week on the podcast. Hamish Pinkham, founder and creative director of the festival had sold half the business to one of the largest entertainment companies in the world, Live Nation.He is still guiding the ship, but has the help of a much bigger network to land acts, run and fund the event. He is still booking the acts and curating the festival, but is now also able to step into some new ventures like The Phoenix Summit, an entertainment industry event in September.To talk the journey to here and what is next, Hamish Pinkham joined the podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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 Paris Georgia's Paris Mitchell Temple and Georgia Cherrie. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices