They already employ 5500 people across 18 global offices. But if the Mowbray siblings are to be believed, they’re only getting started.
Mat, Nick and Anna Mowbray already have a high profile in New Zealand, thanks to their purchase of the Dotcom mansion in the Auckland suburb of Coatesville (which was formerly the Chrisco mansion). They also own a fine collection of sportscars. But like most Kiwis who have made a fortune, the siblings from Tokoroa insist they long ago stopped caring about the trappings of wealth.
“It’s not the money, I don’t care about that. It’s the business and people growth and seeing where we can go next,” Anna Mowbray says.
Their enormously successful company, Zuru, is probably best known for its toy empire, and its wildly popular water balloons. Over the past year Zuru has been involved in several high-profile legal stoushes with its rivals, including Danish toy giant Lego. As you would expect when playing with the big kids, its legal costs are believed to have totalled tens of millions of dollars.
However, the company has other strings to its bow. Its fast-moving consumer goods division, Zuru Edge, includes the biodegradable nappy brand Rascal + Friends. The brand is now available in Walmart Canada and Tesco, and is also sizing up Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, China and the US.
And there is also Zuru Tech, headquartered in Modena, Italy, which is aiming to disrupt the prefabricated building industry by providing high-quality architecture at an affordable price. According to Anna, who is the company’s chief operations officer, Zuru Tech could eventually dwarf the company’s toy line.
Family tradition
There is a fourth Mowbray sibling, Andrew. After studying chemical engineering at university, he now runs his own cashless payments company, Awop, with their father, Harry. The company’s name is an acronym for “another way of paying”, and the business already dominates the events market in New Zealand. It is also popular in Australia and further afield.
The secret to the family’s success is hard work, tenacity and naivety, says Anna. She doesn’t believe in luck.
When Nick and Mat first went to China to explore options for Zuru, both were in their early 20s and neither had finished university. Mat, who has an engineer’s mind, knew the toy market was ripe for disruption. Nick, who is “the best salesman in the world,” according to Anna, was adamant they could break into the sector if they kept pounding on doors.
“We had no preconceived notions about how to do business. We were keen to just get our hands dirty and make a success of whatever we were doing. There was no such thing as failure, only the opportunity to succeed. If we had a hurdle and didn’t overcome it perfectly the first time, we would get back up and do it better the next time,” she says.
Being naïve ensured the siblings kept open minds, and were comfortable with new ways of doing things. Living in China was all part of learning how manufacturing worked “from the ground up,” she recalls. At one stage, they were sleeping under the office desk, as their savings dwindled.
“We knew everything down to the cost of the raw materials, labour and regulations and could negotiate better and set up products and production faster by optimising the process through the value chain. That let us disrupt business in unique ways – not just with engineering but also with pricing.”
As for mixing business with family, Anna puts the trio’s camaraderie down to a concerted effort to not hold grudges, and making decisions on the basis of “two-thirds majority wins.”
Philanthropic work
Working in China also exposed the siblings to the extreme poverty of that country. Now that she has accumulated enough wealth to maintain solid business momentum, Anna wants to support more “considered and thoughtful” philanthropic projects in both China and New Zealand.
“One of the first projects I started on was an orphanage in China that specifically catered to kids with Down’s Syndrome and autism. This was a powerful project for me because it was something I was able to get all our Asian and China team involved with as well.”
She has since moved to an “exciting and fun” project in Shanghai helping about 300 girls from poor, nomadic families who would have been “prone to disappear” without outside help. Now the girls are getting an education and other life-changing assistance.
The siblings also work with Starship Hospital in Auckland, and Anna is planning a charity concert in February, which she hopes will raise at least $300,000 for a new paediatric intensive care unit.
“Right now, the unit only has 22 beds servicing the whole country, and it’s always at 105% occupancy, which means they are slotting a bed in between other beds,” she says.
Although their businesses keep them busy, the siblings are determined to focus on new goals that are satisfying on both a professional and a human level.
“I get so much passion out of watching people grow in the organisation,” says Anna. “I love seeing young talent grow, develop and diversify with the opportunities they get in a fast-paced business like ours. There’s always something new to do every day.”
2018: $1 billion
Anna Mowbray was talking to Grant Walker on August 9, 2019.