Brianne West is a New Zealand entrepreneur and the founder and CEO of Ethique, the world's most sustainable lifestyle and beauty brand. Ethique has, to date, prevented the manufacture and disposal of over 10 million plastic bottles worldwide.
Current work
Having previously founded and sold two other companies, Brianne's passion for environmental conservation, background in cosmetic chemistry and desire to create a business that went beyond just profit led her to establish Ethique in 2012 (while completing her second year of a Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Canterbury). Ethique was established with the mission of ridding the world of plastic bottles, they produce a range of solid beauty bars (not soap), wrapped in certified home-compostable cardboard packaging. Ethique is now distributed in over 16 countries around the globe and is valued in excess of $100 million.
Recognised as one of New Zealand's most successful social enterprises, Ethique has scaled rapidly without compromising on Brianne's core mission of purpose over profit. Every bar is still made using only sustainable, certified vegan, cruelty-free and palm oil-free ingredients and wrapped in certified compostable packaging. Ethique is New Zealand's highest ranking BCorp, living wage certified, carbon positive, plants one tree for every order and donates 20% of annual profits to charity. Ethique's Super Soap Project has donated 30,000 bars of soap since 21st of April 2020 to vulnerable communities across New Zealand and the South Pacific in response to COVID-19.
Awards
Brianne's success with Ethique has seen her awarded as the EY Young Entrepreneur of the Year, Stuff NZ Women of Influence (business enterprise) and be named as an Obama Foundation Leader among many other entrepreneurial, innovation and business accolades.
We felt blessed to have Brianne West from Ethique join us as our guest speaker at the Seed Waikato 2nd Birthday event. This comment from one of the attendees really sums it up for us, 'Brian ... keep reading Seed Waikato
Brianne was our keynote speaker at the sold-out Impact Summit with over 300 young people eager to make a difference. Brianne's story was authentic & relatable and had some great tangible key messages that attendees could take away and put into action. I would highly recommend Brianne as a speaker who can inspire an audience to think differently about the future of business and sustainability.
We were so fortunate to have Brianne speak at our Icehouse annual lunch with an audience made up of Hawkes Bay's most innovative and successful business owners. Brianne captivated the crowd with her wit and humour and insightful address. She kept the audience engaged and wanting more. She was a member of the panel discussion which again entertained and educated the audience.
