As billboards go up for Rhode – the billion dollar beauty brand founded by Hayley Bieber – ahead of its launch here in NZ, lots of beauty fans are feeling excited. And yes, it is exciting – but, is it all good news? What happens to smaller NZ businesses? In this opinion piece Ed&i founder Edna Swart offers a reminder about why now is a good time to shop local.
OPINION
There’s been a lot of excitement since the announcement of global beauty giant Rhode entering the New Zealand market. But as people get ready to stock up on Hailey Bieber certified lip gloss, I’ve been thinking a lot about what it really means when a global beauty brand arrives in a country like ours.
On the surface, it feels exciting. A highly visible brand. More choices for consumers. More noise around beauty as a category. And as a founder, I’m not opposed to competition, local brands live alongside competition every single day. It sharpens thinking, pushes innovation and forces clarity of purpose.
But I do believe it’s important to talk honestly about what sits beneath the headlines, because the reality for local businesses is far more complex than it appears.
ed&i was built in New Zealand from the ground up, without external funding, without major celebrity backing, and without the safety net of global infrastructure. Like many local brands, we grew slowly and deliberately. We hired locally. We worked with New Zealand manufacturers, suppliers, creatives, agencies, printers and warehouses. Every decision carried weight, because every dollar spent circulated back into our local economy.
That part of the story is rarely visible.
When a large, trend-driven global brand enters a small market, the playing field shifts dramatically. The competition is no longer simply about who has the strongest product, clearest values, or most compelling vision. It becomes a comparison between infinite capital and finite resources.
International brands arrive with marketing budgets that can exceed what a local business might turn over in an entire year. They can dominate digital platforms overnight, outbid local brands for visibility, saturate paid influence, and absorb losses as a strategic cost of expansion. Bootstrapped businesses can’t compete in that way, not because we lack creativity, intelligence or ambition, but because we don’t have access to endless spending.
And when that imbalance takes hold, the effects ripple far beyond a single brand.
It impacts employment. It reduces opportunities for New Zealand creatives, manufacturers and suppliers. It makes it harder for homegrown businesses to scale sustainably, to export, and to build something globally recognised from this country. Over time, the ecosystem quietly shrinks, while attention and capital flow elsewhere.
This isn’t a complaint, and it’s not fear of competition. Local founders are resilient, we’ve had to be, particularly over the past five years. But there is an important distinction between competing on performance, innovation and values, and competing against a balance sheet with no ceiling.
New Zealand has long prided itself on supporting local businesses, not out of obligation or nationalism, but because it strengthens our economy, our independence and our creative industries. When you support a local brand, you’re not just buying a product. You’re supporting jobs, skills, families and long-term capability. You’re helping to build businesses that can grow, hire, export and reinvest here.
Global brands will follow trends, as they always have. Their presence is often temporary, dictated by market size, margins and momentum. Local businesses, on the other hand, are committed to building here, staying here, and weathering the harder moments alongside the communities that support them.
Once local brands disappear, they are not easily replaced.
This is simply a reminder that behind every New Zealand brand sits an interconnected ecosystem. When that ecosystem weakens, the impact is felt far beyond retail shelves or social feeds, it’s felt in jobs, in opportunity, and in the future of what we can build from this country.
That’s a conversation worth having.
