A tiny Palmerston North-based company has won a substantial order from international company Procter & Gamble.
Procter & Gamble, which produces a vast array of hygiene and personal care products, chose the Pamper Pack Company, a cottage industry run part-time by husband and wife team Steve and Keryn O'Brien, to provide
a range of products for a Mother's Day promotion.
Pamper Pack produces packs of personal care products and herbal remedies for pregnant women.
Most of its business is conducted over the internet.
"We usually get orders for one or two packs, so we were blown away when the Procter & Gamble order for 8000 packs came in," Keryn O'Brien said. "We were delighted, but a little bit daunted as well."
The original order was for 20,000 packs, consisting of bath salts, massage oils and hand oils, but it was scaled back, to her relief.
"It's costing us $20,000 in postage, but it is profitable for us."
The company has been trading for six months, putting together packs for mothers-to-be when O'Brien, a nurse and childbirth educator, realised women couldn't get all the ingredients in one place.
"I would be sending women to the chemist for rescue remedy, then to a herbal shop for soap and in the end I thought of putting them together myself."
O'Brien and her husband, an air traffic controller, have had to take time off their day jobs to get through the order.
"When Procter & Gamble saw what we had to offer, they told us they were far superior to anything they'd found in Sydney."
- NZPA
