Kerikeri natural products company first NZ grocery brand to achieve international certification

Goodbye founder Becky Cashman of Kerikeri. Photo / Supplied

A Kerikeri based natural products company is the first grocery brand in New Zealand to achieve international certification.

Goodbye has received a NATRUE certification verifying it provides 100 per cent natural and organic cosmetic products.

Goodbye's product range includes Goodbye SANDFLY, a natural bug repellent, Goodbye OUCH, a natural therapeutic balm for the relief of chapped lips, grazes, bruises and bug bites, along with many other uses, and Goodbye NITS, a natural head lice product.

Company founder Becky Cashman said she recently completed the gruelling process to achieve this stringent international certification in a bid to make it easier for the consumer to identify truly natural products from 'faux natural' (false) claims.

"Products claiming to be natural do not always only contain natural products with the use of chemical bases or chemical preservatives being quite common. Consumers need to feel confident they are buying a truly natural product."

We welcomed NATRUE's rigorous standards in defining our products as truly natural and hope other brands will follow suit."

BioGro, New Zealand's largest and best-known certifier for organic produce and products, became a NATRUE approved certifier in 2011 and has set the benchmark for this standard in New Zealand, requiring 100 per cent of ingredients to be natural raw materials, or derived from natural using minimally processed methods.

BioGro says consumers are confused and mislead by the word "natural" on various health and body care products as it is not a regulated market.

BioGro's Technical & Accreditation Manager, Akiko Nicholls, says it realised an urgent need within the industry but it was not an easy decision for a long-term well-known organic certification body to step into the vague "natural" industry.

"We investigated well known international natural standards and the NZ industry supported BioGrow taking up NATRUE accreditation over other natural standards. NATRUE is widely known around the world and carries a lot of weight."