New Zealand’s leading e-commerce platform for creatives, Rubber Monkey, has set its sights on global expansion beginning with a push into the Australian market, thanks in part to a successful capital raise of more than $1.5 million via Snowball Effect.
With over 94,000 products listed online and three branches already established across Auckland, Wellington and Sydney, Rubber Monkey is now looking to expand its offering further abroad. The company generated more than $20 million of revenue in FY22, including $2.5 million through its Australian website despite a minimal presence, marketing and product range.
Entrepreneurial Cofounder and CEO, Laurence Alexander, is confident that the consistent market growth that the company has seen since its inception, both in New Zealand and more recently Australia, will continue as their services become more widely available overseas.
“We’ve seen this Trans-Tasman success as a lucrative opportunity to further our expansion across the ditch. Too often we hear about big Australian companies coming in and taking over smaller operations in New Zealand. This is a genuine opportunity to flip the script and take a New Zealand business to Australia and beyond. We aim to be the first company of our type to do it,” Alexander adds.
Founded through a shared passion for music and film by Laurence Alexander and Nigel Stanford (former TradeMe CEO and Mighty Ape major shareholder), they identified an opportunity to create a specialist offering for the creative community.
The duo had experienced first-hand the fragmented market that Kiwi creatives were sourcing audio and film products from. Barriers such as limited stock ranges, hiked pricing and having to purchase specialty items from multiple retailers acted as the catalyst to starting the company.
Rubber Monkey eliminated such obstacles by providing a unique one-stop-shop for specialist creative products. A key to its early success was the development of Rubber Monkey’s proprietary e-commerce platform, led by ex-TradeMe senior developer and current CTO, Philip Cox.
“Our competitive advantage comes from the highly optimised, bespoke web platform we’ve created. It runs 90% of our business process, not only our sales front-end but also everything from warehousing, shipping, accounts, sales admin, promotions, support and data analytics. Designed from the ground up and utilising the talent and experience of industry leading experts, it’s what sets us apart from the generic ‘off the shelf’ approach to e-commerce.
“My message to entrepreneurs out there is to dream big,” concludes Alexander.
