"We started in a garage, the cliche, and then moved to selling them shop to shop and then from there Mat said let's move to China. I had just done my first year of uni and he said let's pack up and just go so I thought OK," he said. "So we packed up, flew to China, set up and it went from there."
That was eleven years and several innovative, global-selling toys ago. The company is now turning over around half a billion dollars annually - boosted by the Bunch O Balloons craze, which has resulted in a Balloons product being produced every second of every day.
"It's pretty awesome," Mowbray said. "It's probably the number one toy in the world at the moment, [based on] official data out of the US it's been number one since March so it's pretty amazing. I think the next best toy on the list is selling two or three times less than Bunch O Balloons."
Sales numbers will likely decrease after the US summer but Zuru has other plans including its partnerships with Disney and Dreamworks for franchises including Finding Dory and the Trolls movie which is set to be released later in the year, but Mowbray admits it's not all smooth sailing.
"At the end of the day it is a commercial business and so while it's fun, there's also a lot of stress," he said. "It's a fashion industry - things are really hot, really quick and they get really big, but then they can drop off just as fast so you have to have your finger on the pulse all the time to keep the momentum going."
He may have the stresses of helping run a global company, but at just 30 years old, Mowbray's entrepreneurial journey has been one of success.
