Te Awamutu business women gathered last week for the Te Awamutu Chamber of Commerce's first ever Ladies Night.
The Ladies Night event was held at the Peach and Porker, who were one sponsor of the event, and guests were treated to nibbles, a guest speaker and a whisky tasting.
The purpose of the event, started by television anchor and LadyDrinks co-founder Joya Dass, is to bring women together to celebrate victories and to motivate women to achieve their goals.
The idea to bring the event to Te Awamutu was Harshmeen Kaur's, who is treasurer at the Te Awamutu Chamber of Commerce.
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Advertise with NZME.Harshmeen says she was inspired to bring such an event to the community because being from India she explained that women there do not get the same privileges as women do here.
"A lot has changed for me since I moved to this country and I've seen that a lot of women around here want to do so much but they don't always have the opportunity or motivation to do it," says Harshmeen.
"The Ladies Night is to bring us all together and celebrate our victories and our lives."
The guest speaker for the event was Chantelle Good, founder of The Good PA and chairperson of Te Awamutu Chamber of Commerce.
Chantelle told guests about how when she was 24 her kidneys failed and she was on dialysis for eight years. One time she got really sick and was in hospital for a number of weeks which resulted in her having to leave her job.
She says it was this health moment that pushed her to start her own business.
"That health moment was defining for me and it gave me the push I needed to actually start a business, which I had always wanted to do, but sometimes life just goes on and I just cruised along working my 9-3 job," says Chantelle.
Chantelle went fulltime with the Good PA in 2015, running it solely by herself and from her home.
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Advertise with NZME.The business has now grown to a team of five working from their office space on Market St.
She also got a kidney transplant last year and was able to stop dialysis, which she was usually doing for 20 hours a week.
"That gave me some time back and really made me realise how time is our most precious recourse and that we have to use it wisely," says Chantelle.
In between Harshmeen and Chantelle speaking, founder of online liquor shop EightPm and main sponsor of the Ladies Night, Ash Parmar, conducted a whiskey tasting.
Guests tasted three whiskeys during the night which included Jamesons Caskmates Whiskey, Buffalo Trace Bourbon and McClelland's Speyside Single Malt.
The Te Awamutu Chamber of Commerce is hoping to host a Ladies Night each month in Te Awamutu and Harshmeen and Chantelle hope that more women will come to the next one.
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Advertise with NZME."Our theme is to bring women together, to inspire them to do good in the community and hopefully you will all leave this event feeling happy and will want to come to the next one," says Chantelle.
"We are going to be having more of these events so keep your eye out, we think they're going to be pretty popular."
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