Northern Advocate
  • Northern Advocate home
  • Latest news
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Sport
  • Property
  • Video
  • Death notices
  • Classifieds

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • On The Up
  • Business
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
  • Sport
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Residential property listings

Locations

  • Far North
  • Kaitaia
  • Kaikohe
  • Bay of Islands
  • Whangārei
  • Kaipara
  • Mangawhai
  • Dargaville

Media

  • Video
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-Editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

Weather

  • Kaitaia
  • Whangārei
  • Dargaville

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Northern Advocate / Business

Training boosts the bottom line

By Rosemary Roberts
Northern Advocate·
26 Apr, 2012 06:00 PM4 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

Some people blame the Government for everything. Jules Smith is not one of them but she could (jokingly) claim that a government voucher system for part-funding small business capability training might force her to leave home.

Smith has a growing business making natural products for dogs and cats called WashBar.

The 30-month-old business has done so well, the product is now made by a contract manufacturer but is still marketed, packaged and distributed from the family home at rural Kokupu, near Whangarei - for now.

WashBar has run out of space because the client base has trebled since Smith implemented the "very robust" business plan she completed under guidance during capability training last year. Smith says: "We were growing anyway. Now we are not just growing, we are really growing."

She was the first person in Northland to win approval for funding after the voucher scheme was launched last May.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

The scheme, part of a New Zealand Trade and Enterprise/Ministry of Science and Innovation initiative, issues vouchers matching every dollar an approved business owner spends on capability training with a government dollar, up to a maximum of $5000.

Smith invested $1500 of her own money in training with her chosen provider, Globalliance of Kerikeri, which was matched with government money to create a $3000 training package.

Wouldn't someone with a successful corporate background in Auckland and a growing business have better things to do with her money?

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Smith says not. "Sometimes we think we know how to do things but we don't always know how to put all our know-how together to forge ahead," she says.

The assessment of the business after she applied for funding had been an eye-opener, being encouraging about its prospects but frank about deficiencies in analysis of target markets and planning.

"I was told I needed a much more robust business strategy and asked questions like, where do you want to go, what do you want to look like further down the track? Are you recognising the right opportunities?

"The plan set down what we needed to do every month to drive our customer base, and how we should go about it and who we were targeting. It gave us the ability to check off each month how we were progressing, gave us genuine achievable targets to work towards and the confidence to move our business forward, to be able to go to the bank and say, hey, we want an overdraft and you should give us one because we are meeting our monthly targets for growing our client base and we know exactly where we will be next year, and here are the figures to prove it.

"We were supplying between 50 and 60 vet clinics and pet shops around the country when I started working with Globalliance, now we have nearly 200, from Invercargill to Kaitaia.".

"We have had our money well back in terms of the growth of the business and the opportunities we will have to take the business to the next stage."

The next stage is already activated, with WashBar now seeking science and innovation funding to analyse ingredients for new ranges of products.

Jules Smith had casually experimented with making soap before coming north with husband Peter Gregory about three years ago, but developed her first soap for animals in response to a friend's request for a natural product to treat the dog's flea allergy and keep the fleas at bay. Aware of the neem oil's ability to incapacitate insects and assist healing, she formulated a product made from neem oil, neem leaf and Australian-produced tea-tree oil.

Later she developed the product commercially, calling it The Original WashBar.

Customers included owners who were concerned about using chemical topical flea treatments; or wanted a product which could be used between applications of chemical treatments; or were finding the products no longer worked (Smith says fleas are becoming resistant to some chemical treatments).

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Smith says nothing's changed in that respect. "All our products are a direct response to what our customers ask for."

The Original WashBar is for washing dogs; the WashBar Dog Bedding Deodoriser is a "sprinkle and vacuum" product; and the newest product is the WashBar Horse and Hound Soap, where the active natural ingredients are neem oil, lemon myrtle essential oil, and a newly available essential oil, pure kanuka.

A product for cats is in the pipeline. Products are tested on humans first (Smith is always one of them) and then go to the canine test panel, made up of a range of dog breeds and sizes.

Save

    Share this article

Latest from Business

Northern Advocate

Insulation rule changes could cut $15k from new build costs

Northern Advocate

Consumer NZ calls for action on 'shrinkflation' amid rising concerns

Northern Advocate

'It's security': Push for KiwiSaver access to aid young farmers


Sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Business

Insulation rule changes could cut $15k from new build costs
Northern Advocate

Insulation rule changes could cut $15k from new build costs

Northland builders welcome changes to insulation rules, easing building costs.

13 Jul 04:00 AM
Consumer NZ calls for action on 'shrinkflation' amid rising concerns
Northern Advocate

Consumer NZ calls for action on 'shrinkflation' amid rising concerns

03 Jul 05:00 PM
'It's security': Push for KiwiSaver access to aid young farmers
Northern Advocate

'It's security': Push for KiwiSaver access to aid young farmers

27 Jun 05:00 PM


Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky
Sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

06 Jul 09:47 PM
NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • The Northern Advocate e-edition
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Subscribe to the Northern Advocate
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The Northern Advocate
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP