Essay Example on Oha Honey: The Largest Maori-Owned Manuka Honey Company in NZ

Oha Honey is a Manuka honey company that is the largest wholly Maori owned company in New Zealand. The company came from Ngai Tahu, its parent company which is the South Island's principal iwi. The company's name Oha is a reflection of a long-term journey that was taken to get the Manuka honey unique product to the world. Oha honey company delivers its Manuka honey to the world in two flagship global brands, which include the Watson & Son and Rose Gold brands. It also offers the honey product in a range of private label brands which were developed in partnership with the company's customers for particular markets. In conjunction with the company's premium New Zealand Manuka, the company provides several Manuka honey products which include Manuka powder, Manuka lozenges as well as Manuka snap packs. It also offers delicious varieties of the native honey in New Zealand, ranging from the dark and rich Kamahi and Rewarewa to wildflower, mellow and light clover.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

The company sources and packs all its honey products in New Zealand. Its products are some of the most trusted and respected on the honey market and are usually available in more than 1000 retail outlets as well as leading online stores across the globe. Manuka honey is commonly mono-floral honey that is generally produced from the nectar of Leptospermum scoparium, a manuka tree. Alternatively, this honey is mostly sold as a medicine, although there is no conclusive evidence that shows the dietary or medicinal value of the manuka honey despite as a sweetener. Today the Manuka honey is widely identified as the most beneficial and unique form of honey globally. Manuka honey constitutes Methylglyoxal a sugar molecule that can be up to over a hundred times stronger in Manuka honey than the ordinary honey. Oha honey produces dark and amber honey that is strongly flavored with intense caramel notes, aromatic woody as well as nutty characteristics notes.

Oha honey has a heather scent, damp earth with some slight bitter medicinal and medium sweet taste, which makes the company's customers comment that it has the best tasting Manuka honey, which they had never felt before. The premium market positioning, purity as well as quality of the two brands of Oha honey makes them be admired across the globe. The company has over 30,000 beehives, which are located in some of the most beautiful parts in New Zealand. Oha honey partners with the landowners to enable them to place the hives in the remote areas where Manuka trees are most dense. The honey is usually harvested when the Manuka trees flower; it is taken back to the company's plant where it is packed with the complete bare minimum of intervention.

Market Background

Apiculture New Zealand is the first industry body that deals with apiculture in the entire country representing all sectors of the honey industry. The mission of the ApiNZ organization is to support as well as deliver benefits to the apiculture industry in New Zealand. The organization promotes a positive business environment and industry profile as well as creating opportunities for all its members. It also plays a significant role in advocating on behalf of its members about the different issues that affect the apiculture industry. Apiculture New Zealand markets the Manuka honey of its members both locally and internationally. As a result, the Manuka honey from New Zealand has seen its demand in the global market increase over the past decade. In 2016, for example, Manuka honey that was exported earned the industry over $281 million.

The global import demand for the Manuka honey is estimated to be about US$2.1 billion, and its as a result of this that the local investors and New Zealand in partnership plan to increase New Zealand's export of their Manuka honey up to US$1.2 billion by the year 2028. The honey companies within the industry, such as the Oha honey company, are therefore leading companies that are taking advantage of this global demand and enhancing their production, sales, and distribution of their honey to ensure that they meet the set target. So far, Oha honey has over 1000 supply stores across the globe where they sell their products as well as many more online stores, including the Amazon and the US base based Vtabeauti.com platform. The company decided to work in partnership with the online stores to ensure that they get to any part of the globe without many investments, which would call for an increase in the price of the product. The company has managed to enter and be ranked among the best Manuka honey companies in the global market under its brand Watson and Son.

Competencies and Capabilities

Oha honey company offers top quality products to its customers who have a high amount of Methylglyoxal than most companies do in the global market, therefore, enabling the company to have a competitive advantage in the supply of high-quality Manuka honey in the world market. Its product brand Watson & Son, is according to the Oha honey chief commercial officer Jarrod Smith, a 100% pure New Zealand product; it is 100% natural as well as 100% traceable. This makes the company's products a trusted brand globally and available in over 1000 retail outlets as well as the global leading online stores.

The company also recently launched its Molan Gold Standard range of Manuka in the United States' market. Molan Gold Standard is a government certified and 100% Oha honey owned as a mark that assures quality and purity as well as appraising as the marker of a marker of natural Methylglyoxal that is found in Manuka, honey. According to Smith, Oha honey is focused on being the most trustworthy producer of Manuka honey across the globe. Since honey is one of the products with absolute integrity because it only has one ingredient, then the company is currently working tirelessly to ensure the world recognizes it as a company that handles business with complete sincerity. This is a dream come true for the company based on the measure they have in place to ensure that its products are pure and of the highest quality in the market.

Organization Structure

Oha honey company is 100% owned by Ngai Tahu, the southern region principal Maori iwi of New Zealand. The company is led by Nadine Tunley who is the chief executive officer with over 30 years of experience working in the New Zealand Food & Fibre industry specifically dairy, pip fruit, meat as well as seafood. Under Nadine is Dominic Blackie, who is the chief financial officer leading the corporate and financial service functions such as information technology, finance, corporate relations, information management, honey buying, legal, risk as well as human resource. Blackie also plays the role of the company secretary within Oha honey. Jarrod Smith is the chief commercial officer at Oha honey.

He leads the commercial functions globally, including the sales, export logistics, business development, quality assurance, marketing, market research and consumer insights, global distributor relations, new product development as well as production within Oha honey company. Jarrod has had an extensive leadership experience at the executive having first large international and national divisions within a wide range of competitive and diverse industries across Asia-Pacific, North America, China, Europe and the UK where he successfully delivered margin expansion, organizational sales capability growth, sustainable market share growth, launching new brands and products globally, providing a year to year revenue growth as well as the opening of new market opportunities.

Ben Bateman is the chief strategy and partnership office at Oha honey which leads the company's partnership and strategy functions which include leading the company's national team of relationship managers in securing the resource Manuka to meet the company's hive placement targets, he leads the monitoring and development of the organizational strategy of Oha honey, leading implementation and development of partnership-focused strategic growth plans as well as leading the health and safety team of Oha honey. All the leaders are highly skilled, having worked on high rated ranks in different companies and industries within New Zealand. This guarantees high quality and competitive leadership within Oha honey, giving the company an advantage and a capacity to get through to its target position in the world market.

Supply Chain Review

Oha honey controls 100% of its supply chain, an advantage that makes the company unique and different from any other Manuka honey brands in the market. The company manages the honey production starting from the setting up of the hives in areas dense with Manuka, rearing of the queen bees to the hive management, extraction of honey from the colonies, transportation of the honey to Oha plant as well as the packaging of the honey into jars. This gives the company an advantage to ensure that its honey is of top quality since there are no third parties that interfere with the entire production of the Watson & Son products.

Before releasing their products into the market, Oha honey uses the Molan Gold Standard and the methylglyoxal standards of measurement; however, this depends on the country that the customer is purchasing the honey from. The aim of using these standard measurements is to give their customers the full confidence that the products have accurate and scientifically measurements conducted to prove the claimed content of Methylglyoxal. In every batch of Manuka honey that Oha honey releases to the market constitute a lab certificate that can be made available upon request by a customer. The company sells its products both locally and globally to over 1000 retail outlets from Auckland to London and Shanghai to Sydney as well as through the world-leading online stores such as Amazon and more.

Flow of Information

Oha honey has an administrative department that is the point of contact for Oha honey on a local level where all information regarding partners and customers is passed through. Jarrod Smith, who is the chief commercial officer of the company leading the company on an international level ensures a smooth running of customers' and partners' information into the company to make sales and distribution of the company's product to global customers. The information that the department deals with is on inventory, documentation, orders, complaints, shipping as well as any other inquiries concerning the company and its products.

Flow of Funds

To make an order from Oha honey, customers are required to create an account with the company where they place their orders and are given options to pay for the products through the company's bank account or cash payments upon delivery within New Zealand. The shipping is free within the country; however, the prices are not fixed; they keep changing. The customer pays in New Zealand Dollars. The company does not do small shipping internationally currently but is partnering with different organizations, stores, and online stores globally to ensure the product gets to global customers. This means that Oha honey does not sell its products to the international customers themselves; they outsource this service.

Flow of Inventory

The flow of the honey product starts from when the company workers collect it from beehives located in different parts of the country to Oha honey plant when it is packed in jars then it is distributed to various stores within the country and globally where the stores sell the products to end-user, and that is the point where the flow ends.

Suppliers

Oha honey does not get a supply of its Manuka honey from any third party; however, the company partners with local landowners in different parts of...