Kiwi Bites boss scoops out honour

Sandy Mecredy.

Kerikeri entrepreneur Sandy Mecredy of Kiwi Bites has won Top Energy's Business Development Fund award.

The award includes $30,000 and six months of business mentoring.

Ms Mecredy was originally motivated by a desire to provide a healthy alternative to junk food and tested her sliced dehydrated kiwifruit snack on some of the nation's toughest critics - teenagers.

A first-time applicant, Ms Mecredy says the grant will be used to upgrade existing factory equipment and she would like to employ a local marketing graduate to help expand the business and research new markets - both local and overseas.

She also wants extend her range to include other local produce such as feijoas and figs and she sees potential for the business to provide a viable employment option for young people wanting to stay in the area.

The business also gives a second life to kiwifruit rejected for export by pack-houses. In one pack-house alone 1400 tonnes of kiwifruit were rejected last season.

Top Energy chief executive Russell Shaw says Kiwi Bites was a clear winner for this year's business grant, which fosters local business initiatives that contribute to the economic prosperity of the Far North. Mr Shaw says the judges were impressed with Ms Mecredy's commitment to drawing on local resources to grow and diversify the business and he sees a great future for Kiwi Bites.

Grants of up to $30,000 are awarded twice a year for local business ideas or initiatives that have the potential to grow or diversify the Far North economy.

The money is either awarded in full to a single stand-out idea or in smaller amounts to several initiatives, depending on the number, quality and merit of the applications received. This year there were 13 entries which were shortlisted to three.