Image: NZ Herald, from a Hawke’s Bay Today article by Mitchell Hageman.
The area where the Ruminate factory is located on Waitangi Road, Awatoto, was not spared by Cyclone Gabrielle, which hit Napier especially hard on Valentines Day, 2023.
Jack told the Hawke’s Bay Today:
“We’d built the current building about two years earlier. We were in here for just two weeks shy of two years. It was pretty devastating. It took 10 days before we could get in. The first time I had to get in by boat.”
Mud, water and silt flooded through the factory and destroyed many thousands of dollars of product and equipment.
With the Timaru factory working hard to take up the slack, and clean up underway in Napier, FPG (Future Products Group) Founder and former Hawke’s Bay businessperson of the year Robert Darroch provided the essential missing piece of the puzzle when he invited the Ruminate team to use a spare room in FPG's offices for 10 months, rent-free.
“It was completely out of the blue; the generosity was amazing - Robert said here’s the coffee machine, we’ve put some beers in the fridge, so fill your boots.”
