Face painter taps into sport psyche

By ELLEN READ

New Zealand has a sports-mad culture. Like it or not, there's no avoiding the topic - newspapers, television, radio, even taxi drivers are all keen to share their views on rugby, cricket or netball.

Auckland entrepreneur Sarah Norrie saw a marketing opportunity in this passion and used it to build a successful business.

Inspired by watching fans at various games, she set out to tap into the sports fan psyche and after much research - which told her that face paint was hard to find and fairly expensive - she knew she was on to a good thing.

"I realised no one was packaging paints specifically for sporting teams," she said. "The other big problem was once you have it, what do you do with it? Where do you start?"

The result is True Colours - face paints packaged specifically for each team and complete with suggestions on painting designs.

Whether the fan supports the Silver Ferns or a local rugby team, there's a kit to suit, complete with paints and design suggestions.

A limited budget means Norrie hasn't been able to run print advertisements or radio commercials, but this has not hampered True Colours' progress.

In fact, she says, that marketing approach wouldn't really suit the product.

Instead, she attends games and paints people's faces, or hires students to wander round The Warehouse shops in face paint on the day of big games.

"I've more done the below-the-line stuff," she said. "I think it is a feel environment rather than just a 30-second ad."

Norrie is also careful about the way her product is presented. The New Zealand-made logo is proudly displayed and the name True Colours evokes a New Zealand feeling - although Norrie denies getting her inspiration from the Split Enz album of the same name.

The idea is deceptively simple but it has been a huge success.

"Face painting is a really exciting and creative way of supporting your team," Norrie said. "Just look at the football World Cup in Korea and Japan this year. The fans used face paint to really express themselves and it added to the whole energy and vibe of the event."

She's right. It's always the fans with the colourful faces that the television cameras zoom in on, or who appear on the front page of a newspaper.



Born and raised in Wellington, one of Norrie's first jobs was in Seoul, and then Tokyo, encouraging students to come and study in New Zealand.

She has also sold hotdog and nacho Machines to bars and pubs in Wellington, and has even owned a cheerleading team.

Norrie's innovative marketing talents shone out, and after a stint at Wellington's More FM she was headhunted by Classic Hits in Auckland.

She then moved to the Radio Bureau where she represented radio stations throughout the country and dealt with advertising agencies.

Norrie now works as an account director for advertising agency Torre Lazur, a subsidiary of McCann Erickson.

"While I was working at the Radio Bureau, I realised that in business relationships are everything," she said.

"If you haven't got them, you may as well pack up and go home. And that's when I started to think there's got to be more to life than working for someone else and getting your pay packet once a month."

She was earning good money, so could pay for the research and design costs associated with starting a new business.

"But that was scary as I was getting poorer and poorer by the minute. But I guess it was too late to turn back.

"There were days when I thought how could I afford to do this, I've just spent $35,000 on designs. I just kept telling myself it's only money and life is so much bigger than that."

The first organisation Norrie approached, Netball New Zealand, was enthusiastic and agreed to license the products. The Silver Ferns even appear on the kit, modelling face paint designs in their colours of black, white and red.

Next up she negotiated with The Warehouse to be her national distributor, selling the packs for $17.99.

More recently, True Colours became the first merchandise to be sold from the Ticketek booking website and Norrie is also developing an America's Cup face painting kit to be sold by a supermarket chain over summer.

The positive response from the public has reinforced Norrie's plans to take True Colours to Australia.

She is already talking to the NRL and the AFL and, even further afield, is dreaming of the next football World Cup in Germany.

"New Zealand is a great place to trial something but we're so small. The opportunities are abroad."