This countdown to Christmas/Kirihimete, I gift to you… inspiration. On the final day to Christmas, I’d like to introduce the visionary Brianne West.
Brianne is a trailblazer, an entrepreneur, the Founder of Ethique (originally Sorbet), and was recently immortalised as a Barbie Doll.
She was born in the United Kingdom and her whānau moved to Aotearoa in 1994.
In 2012, while studying for a Bachelor of Science at the University of Canterbury, she founded Ethique (French for ethical) in her kitchen. She had grown frustrated by the tremendous amount of single-use waste being produced by the health and beauty industry. So, while studying, she sought education in cosmetic chemistry and looked to create her first solid shampoo bar. The environment and science had long been two of her passions. “I figured that switching to a solid product would be the answer not only to the water waste issue, but also plastic waste”, states Brianne on Ethique’s website.
Alongside her mum Janette, they created small, 1kg batches of shampoo and she sold them on her own website and was surprised by the volume of positive responses.
She initially funded Ethique by reinvesting all her profits and then she was paired with a business mentor to write a business plan, who became one of her business partners.
In 2015, she raised capital through PledgeMe, with the goal of offering up shares in Ethique to attract enough investors to instigate growth. In just under ten days, the Ethique Team raised $200,000 from 152 people around Aotearoa.
In 2016, Ethique went international, with the help of exposure through features in Forbes and The Huffington Post and celebrity endorsements by Britney Spears and Ashton Kutcher.
Ethique is plastic-free and regenerative and is now stocked in over 6,800 stores in twenty-five countries across the world.
“True self-care is not salt baths and chocolate cake, it is making the choice to build a life you don’t need to regularly escape from.”
Photo: Brianne West, LinkedIn.