BWX went under – by a new entity called Future Collective.  The business was born out of a partnership between Flora & Fauna founder and former owner Julie Mathers and one of New Zealand’s biggest players in online health and wellness retail, HealthPost.  We spoke to HealthPost’s chief executive Abel Butler about what the deal means for the three e-commerce businesses, as well as the new opportunities it creates.  Inside Retail: Can you tell me a bit about HealthPost, and its place in the New Zealand and Australian health and beauty market? Abel Butler: HealthPost was established in 1988 by my mother Linley as a mail-order catalogue business, run out of her home. I got involved in the early 2000s to convert it from mail-order to a web-based business – we were very early to start selling online; we started transacting online in 2002.  That allowed us to build out the competencies of online retail in what was a very early stage, and from there we’ve grown a lot.  We continue to be New Zealand’s largest online retailer of primarily natural health and skincare, clean beauty, and eco-living.  We’re still doing it from where the business was originally started, from Golden Bay – a rural community on the South Island – and we’ve got a team of about 70 people there who work in the warehouse and contact centre, etc. We also have an Auckland office where we handle marketing and finance. At this point we’ve got over 6,000 products, and a couple hundred thousand customers. We primarily sell other people’s products, but we do have our own brand of products called BioBalance, which we’ve been doing for over a decade.  Most of our sales are in New Zealand, and second after that is Australia, but we also send our products all across the world.  IR: Can you give me an idea of the differences between the New Zealand and Australian health and beauty markets?  AB: There are certainly differences, but there are also commonalities. A lot of the leading brands in Australia are also the leading brands in New Zealand.  There are some regulatory differences in natural health in particular, but overall it’s fairly similar – you’ve got the same mega-trend toward growing consumer demand for natural, ethically made and eco-friendly products. We’ve still got quite a lot to learn about the lay of the land around the leading Australian suppliers and brands that we’re not already dealing with, but we’re obviously picking that up at pace now.  IR: Yes, together with Julie Mathers of Snuggle Honey, HealthPost recently purchased the rights to Flora & Fauna and Nourished Life from BWX. They both primarily trade in Australia. Can you tell me a bit about that decision? AB: Sure. We don’t think there’s anything quite like HealthPost in the Australian market, with a really strong focus on ethics and really rigorous ingredient and product standards across the clean beauty space.  However, we’ve been watching and admiring the progress of Flora & Fauna and Nourished Life for a number of years, and had kept in touch with Julie and [husband and business partner] Tom [Abraham] following their exit. We’d catch up and talk about things relating to sustainability: there is a lot of common ground there, and I didn’t ever really see her as a competitor.  I’d been following the situation, and heard the news that the companies had gone into administration and receivership under BWX, and I reached out to Julie and asked if she would be interested in what [a buy-up] would look like. Right from the outset, she agreed that HealthPost would be a great partner to work with, so it really went from there.  The whole idea is really founded on a shared commitment to ethical business, sustainability, strong product criteria, and giving back to the community.  IR: What opportunities and benefits does bringing these brands under the same umbrella as HealthPost deliver?  AB: It’s very much a shared skillset. We’re all very good at the online retail of natural products with a focus on ethical and sustainable business practices – that’s exactly what we do, and I think we do it pretty well in the New Zealand market.  Both Flora & Fauna and Nourished Life were previously really successful businesses, and have a large, pre-existing customer base, and so the opportunity there is to take the things that we do well, with Julie and Tom, and supply these brands at a larger scale.  There are differences across the three brands as well, and it’s important that we retain that so they’re not carbon copies of one another, but I think the skills and expertise and rigour in ethical business practices are common across all of them, and it’s what our customers respond to as well.  IR: How far along is the process in terms of finalising the deal with BWX? What’s the next step and vision for the next year? AB: The deal is effectively concluded. We’re in control now, and the first thing we need to do is get these brands up and trading.  We’re going to do that locally within Australia, and that’s going to require a fair bit of work, so we’re in the process of securing a warehouse space, speaking to suppliers, rebuilding inventory, and reviewing the technology to make sure it’s all efficient.  We’re looking forward to getting it all up-and-running as quickly as possible.  We understand it’s been a pretty challenging period for these businesses’ suppliers and customers, and we’ve absolutely thrilled with the response we’ve gotten from them.