Category: Business

Source: Radio New Zealand

Gold Rush: Who’s cashing in on Queenstown? An RNZ series examining the money flowing into Queenstown – and who’s missing out.

Workers are arriving in Queenstown and leaving within weeks because the cost of living is too high, recruiters and unions say.

Despite record-high visitor spending and hundreds of job listings, data shows a growing gap between average pay rates and day-to-day living costs in the district.

Café worker Orla Marshall, from Scotland, was living in a van – the only way she had been able to return to Queenstown after finding it too costly last winter, she said.

She initially rented a room in a flat with her partner in Fernhill at a below-average $220 per week – but it came with “very expensive” heating, she said.

“A lot of our paycheque was going towards that. And we did not necessarily find Queenstown to have higher wages, just higher prices,” she said.

According to Hospitality NZ, hospitality roles in Queenstown paid $28.51 per hour on average – just 2.4 percent higher than elsewhere in the country.

Data from Infometrics showed across the board, the average Queenstown worker earned $69,788 – 12 percent below the New Zealand average.

Meanwhile, both rents and house prices in Queenstown Lakes District were the most expensive in New Zealand.

Rents had risen faster than earnings, to their least affordable rate since 2000, Infometrics data showed – taking an average 27.2 percent of each renter’s income.

The average weekly rent in Queenstown was $707, compared to the New Zealand average of $573.

Groceries, fuel and other expenses all seemed to carry a Queenstown premium, Marshall said.

“I just cannot comprehend how [employers] expect people to be able to get by on the wages that they offer,” she said.

“If there are customers coming in, tours coming in, they are charging more, they are making more – but they are paying you the same as they would anywhere else, which is quite ridiculous.”

‘You can do the equation – it does not work’: union

Unite Union regional organiser Simon Edmunds said in the hospitality industry, he knew of people enduring poor rentals or working second jobs to get by.

“There are certainly some businesses that pay minimum wage in Queenstown – $23.50. Paying $300-400 for a room. You can do the equation – that does not work,” he said.

The average hospitality wage of $28.50 or the national living wage of $29 per hour was far from enough, he said.

“It is not just rent – food prices here are crazy expensive. Petrol is expensive … parking is incredibly expensive, and there are no provisions made for workers to get discounts.”

In 2023, workers had been resorting to living in their cars, tents, hostels and couch surfing to get by amid a shortage of rentals, he said.

Now, many were simply choosing other places to live, he said.

“A lot of people end up leaving. There is an awful lot of workers that come here with hopes. That try it out. That find they are just not saving money or even going backwards, and they will leave for somewhere else in New Zealand if they can, or overseas again.”

Demand for workers ‘crazy’: recruiter

Shauna O’Sullivan, area sales manager for recruitment company Remarkable People, said demand for staff was higher than ever, with hundreds of jobs available.

“It is just crazy busy down here. It is insane. I have been with the company for four years now, and this is the busiest it has ever been,” she said.

“The demand for skilled workers is very high and it is very, very difficult to find those that are staying and can commit to the work that needs to be done.”

She said high turnover was a huge factor in the job market – and she too was seeing people leave roles almost immediately.

“People do seem to be coming through and then leaving quite promptly… we place people into long-term roles and then maybe a week or two later they come back and say, look, I cannot afford to live here,” she said.

Many were looking across the ditch for higher wages.

“We are losing a lot of people to Australia,” she said.

Workers in, workers out

Edmunds said he was not holding out hope for employers to pay their workers more.

Queenstown appeared to be turning into a “high churn” economy, where employers – particularly in the tourism sector – paid poorly but recruited often, he said.

“There are good employers who have long-term staff, but they are a bit far and few between … for a lot of employers, they just accept that that is what you do in Queenstown and have adapted accordingly,” he said.

Edmunds said Queenstown had always been expensive place to live – but it should not just be a playground for the ultra-rich, he said.

“Queenstown can be a place that can have ultra-high-end tourism, beautiful, $20 million mansions and even billionaire bunkers… but what is to stop it from being a place where the people – who actually run it, who actually do the work and keep the shops open, who did right through Covid, who actually are committed long term to the place – actually get some of those rewards as well?”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

• Business confidence improves to highest level since March 2014
• Net 39 percent expect economic improvement vs +17 pct in September survey
• Businesses report better demand, plan to invest and hire more.
• Inflation pressures contained around 3 pct, expected to gradually decline
• Survey suggests annual growth around 1.4 pct, RBNZ to hold interest rates steady

Business sentiment rebounded strongly at the end of last year, with firms reporting improved sales and planning to hire staff and increase investment.

The Institute of Economic Research’s (NZIER) closely followed Quarterly Business Survey for the three months ended December showed a net 39 percent of respondents believed economic conditions would get better in coming months, compared to a net 17 percent in the December survey.

“There is a turnaround in demand, with lower interest rates finally gaining traction,” NZIER principal economist Christina Leung said.

Weak sales were still cited as the chief constraint on businesses, but the pressures were easing, with only 3 percent reporting lower sales in the quarter.

Expectations were for improved growth in the coming quarter, with a net 23 percent forecasting a lift in their own business – up from 10 percent in the previous quarter.

Leung said businesses were increasingly feeling confident about investing in plants and machinery and hiring more stuff.

“Firms increased staff numbers and are feeling more positive about hiring in the next quarter.”

However, she said there were signs that firms were finding it more difficult to find skilled staff in the manufacturing and construction sectors, which could point to future labour shortages.

She said inflation pressures were contained with fewer firms expecting higher costs and also fewer expecting to have to raise their prices, which indicated inflation gradually falling back to the middle of the Reserve Bank’s 1-3 percent target band.

Leung said the survey indicated the economy was recovering but the increase in growth was likely to be slower than previously thought, with annual growth about 1.4 percent.

“With demand starting to recover but inflation remaining contained, we expect no further OCR cuts in this monetary policy cycle.”

“We forecast the OCR to trough at 2.25 percent until the Reserve Bank.. commences increasing the OCR in the second half of 2026,” Leung said.

The manufacturing sector was the most optimistic of respondents, followed by service industries.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

It was a quiet end to December for many retailers.

Data from Worldline shows that spending across its payment network through December was below the levels recorded a year earlier.

Consumer spending processed through all core retail merchants in 2025 reached $4.702 billion, which was down -0.2 percent on December 2024.

The biggest decline was in Wellington, which was down 3.7 percent. Bay of Plenty was down 2.6 percent while Whanganui was up 4.1 percent.

Chief sales officer Bruce Proffit said the data showed a tough retailing environment over the last month of the year.

“There was more spending at food and liquor stores in Worldline’s network across December, which is consistent with generally higher food prices and people prioritising the essentials in their budgets,” he said.

Food and liquor merchant spending was up 4 percent year-on-year in December, similar to the 4.4 percent food price inflation rate reported in November.

Spending across the other retailers was down 4.4 percent.

Proffit said there was more spending online.

“The online spending processed through Worldline was up +18.9 percent in December. This pattern is likely to be repeated amongst other online payments systems, judging by earlier reports and international patterns.”

Boxing Day non-food shopping reached $51m, down 12.4 percent on Boxing Day 2024.

“Boxing Day was generally a busier day for clothing merchants, but for most other non-food stores in our network, their busiest days were still in the two days prior to Christmas Day,” Proffit said.

He said it was clear that Boxing Day spending was not as high as Black Friday, when sales hit $55.6m.

Carolyn Young, chief executive at Retail NZ, said it showed how tough it was to be a retailer.

She said recent announcements of the planned closure of EB Games and the liquidation of the Yoyoso group highlighted this.

“The retail sector has been under significant strain over the last two to three years, with businesses advising that they have been absorbing as many cost increases as they can, working harder than ever as margins are being squeezed, which have created significant challenges for businesses to remain open. We will be hoping for a brighter economy and positive consumer confidence in 2026.”

She said shoppers could help by ensuring they made their purchases with local retailers.

“Either in New Zealand or online but making sure they are New Zealand stores you’re buying from that keeps the economy going in New Zealand. That’s critically important.”

She said growth in the tourism sector would also help to get international money into New Zealand people buying and spending.

“We need further economic growth and job growth. We’ve been in a period of unemployment, we’ve seen unemployment rising, people are still concerned about job security.

“So until we’ve got greater confidence in our job position and you know it’s going to be a challenge for individuals to feel confident about being able to spend on something rather than putting it aside in case they don’t have a job. There’s still more to do in terms of the economy.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

A South Waikato official is calling for people to take responsibility for their actions to protect a nearly five-kilometre walkway at the Blue Spring near Putāruru.

South Waikato Mayor Gary Petley said cars are reportedly parking dangerously along the route, coins are tossed into the water and rubbish is caught in the trees all around.

Other officials want help to further manage and protect the country’s assets and taonga.

Regional Council chairperson Warren Maher told Morning Report the issues are caused by poor behaviour and an influx of visitors.

“There is a composting toilet on the walkway, but what’s happening is visitors are actually throwing rubbish down it, so there was an issue with that blocking up which had to bring in contractors to clear that out,” he said.

“People are throwing coins into the springs, I mean, it’s not a wishing well, it is a beautiful natural environment out there, and then of course the illegal and dangerous parking which are causing some major issues on those roadways leading in.”

He said if the toilets get blocked up, people could start using the sides of the walkways instead.

“That’s going to get into the waterways, we just don’t want that happening,” he said.

“People need to take a little bit of responsibility, it’s a beautiful area, it’d be a shame if access was restricted because of these ongoing issues.”

Maher said there was potential for an access fee to be put in place.

He suggested the idea of busing people to the site.

“You get a little bit of return, you get a little bit of money coming into the local area, bit like they’ve done up in Cathedral Cove up on the Coromandel,” he said.

“It’s something I think that needs to be looked at, just to help manage that heavy population that’s heading out there through this peak holiday time.”

Maher raised concerns about the costs of extra work along the track falling back on ratepayers.

“To me, it should be a little bit of give and take,” he said.

Maher conceded it wouldn’t be possible to restrict access to only those who have paid.

“You’d have to provide some sort of service, I think, to be able to put some sort of target on it as a such.”

He believed some of the International Visitor Levy should be reinvested into local councils to support their work.

“Tourism is one of our big earners, as such, especially around the Waikato,” Maher said.

“We’ve got some pretty amazing sites, so it’d be nice to see some of that money come into those local councils, just to help support the work that’s actually done on the ground that the people are coming to visit.”

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Source: Radio New Zealand

For Christchurch father of two Joe Baxter, there was no question he needed to act fast when alarms were raised over asbestos in children’s play sand sold by Kmart.

“We were doing what was logical, we were removing the threat,” the teacher said.

It was mid-November when the alert went out; three Magic Sand colour sets and a sandcastle building kit were being recalled after testing positive for tremolite, a form of asbestos.

“We had to act, without good information we had to act on it and clear it up as quickly as possible,” Baxter told RNZ.

One of the three tubs in the house matched the batch numbers being recalled.

Toys were thrown out and carpet ripped up from about three-quarters of the house that had the sand in it.

But weeks later came an about turn – the recall was cancelled – Kmart said there was no evidence of asbestos in the initially recalled sand.

“So there’s two-and-a-half, three weeks in which time what were we meant to do?” Baxter said.

“Were we meant to leave our house contaminated? Were we meant to live with the idea that we had asbestos in the house while children were playing?”

That wasn’t a feasible option, Baxter said.

“And it’s not something we could have done in good conscience, so we had to act to remove it.

“We wanted to know that we’d done everything possible to make sure that the hazard was not there in the house.”

Baxter did not get the house tested for contamination before lifting up the carpet, but pointed to the official recall of asbestos already being found in the batch of sand his family had.

“One of the products that we had in our house was confirmed by them to be having asbestos in it at the time,” he said.

“Really, there was no need to get that batch tested because they themselves had confirmed the asbestos in it.

“So what we needed to do then was not to pay more money to confirm what we already knew,” he said.

What needed to happen, Baxter said, was to remove the hazard as quickly as possible.

The carpet came up in a day with the help of Baxter’s father.

“The living room, the hallway, the kids’ bedroom, we removed that because we knew there were trace elements, we could see it,” he said.

“Or, we just knew that it had been played with in there.”

That left Baxter and his family out of carpet and out of pocket and struggling for guidance from Kmart since.

Complicating matters, was that the family had three tubs of play sand – one purchased from Kmart and two identical tubs bought from a charity second-hand store.

He cannot tell for certain which outlet the tub with the initially recalled batch number came from.

That has left Baxter unsure what his rights are, but he believed Kmart should be involved.

“I believe there’s a wrong that needs to be righted here, I think there needs to be some accountability at the very least for this,” Baxter said.

“We’ve tried to contact them on numerous occasions but effectively we haven’t got anything back,” he said of his efforts to talk further with Kmart.

“We’ve been told that we’ll be contacted by the customer services team… we just didn’t hear back from them, so that was really frustrating.”

Baxter also wanted Kmart to provide the testing that had been done on the coloured sand products.

Kmart ‘haven’t been particularly forthcoming’ – Consumer

Baxter believed Kmart still shouldered some responsibility though his family couldn’t tell whether the affected sand was bought directly or from the charity store.

Gemma Rasmussen, Consumer’s head of research and advocacy, said Kmart “haven’t been particularly forthcoming” in its communications.

“We are disappointed with Kmart’s response in relation to what’s transpired and it does seem that they aren’t being as proactive in terms of giving shoppers guidance around what their rights are and what Kmart is owed to do,” she said.

“So we would hope that they would be a little bit more on the front foot with this.”

Under the Consumer Guarantees Act, it was the manufacturer that shouldered responsibility for a product,” Rasmussen said.

“So they could, potentially be contacting Kmart, assuming Kmart are also the manufacturer, and really looking to get a right of response and some responsibility acknowledged there,” she told RNZ.

“And I think this really highlights some of the issues that we have with our product safety laws in New Zealand,” Rasmussen said.

“I think that it’s very unsettling for shoppers to be thinking that potentially there are products on shelves that are unsafe.”

The sand was from Anko, Kmart’s in-house brand which describes itself as being “trusted by millions” and owned by Kmart Australia Ltd and part of the Kmart Group.

Kmart referred to previous statements when asked about Baxter’s case.

Baxter believed they do have responsibility.

“They need to come to the party and do what we think is the right thing to do,” he said.

“I suppose it’s a bit feeling in limbo land about some that’s, you know, your kids and your family’s safety at the end of the day.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

How old is too old for a home loan?

One woman who argued that she should not have been allowed to take out a mortgage, given her age and that of her husband, has lost her complaint to the Banking Ombudsman – and mortgage advisers say it is not unusual for age to be a hurdle for some borrowers.

The Banking Ombudsman said the woman and her husband first applied for a home loan in 2020, when they were aged 56 and 53. In 2022, they agreed to take out loans worth $479,000.

But in 2025, the woman’s husband died, and she claimed the loan was irresponsible and should not have been approved.

She said the bank had not considered her and her husband’s ages, and the 30-year loan term.

She said they had never intended to work past typical retirement age or to increase their repayments.

The ombudsman looked into the case, including the bank’s notes from the time, and said the bank had considered the couple’s age and future plans, as well as discussing with them how they planned to repay the loan.

“We also reviewed the bank’s affordability assessment. The bank verified income and expenses, applied conservative calculations and included reasonable buffers.

“There was a reasonable surplus of income over expenses and the bank made inquiries about likely changes to income. We found the bank had reasonable grounds to believe the couple could meet repayments without suffering substantial hardship, having regard to any likely changes in income.”

The complaint was not upheld.

Link Advisory head Glen McLeod said he saw many borrowers in that sort of situation.

He said banks and lenders would have different policies for loan terms that would take people past the age of 65.

“Some set a maximum age of 65, while others may allow terms to extend to 70 or even 75.

“The key consideration is always the client’s exit strategy, which is discussed as part of the lending process. An exit strategy outlines how the loan will be repaid, and provides confidence for both the client and the lender.

“This could include using KiwiSaver funds at retirement, selling an investment property or downsizing their home.

“Ensuring clients fully understand what they’re borrowing and the long-term implications is an essential part of the Responsible Lending Code. This approach helps protect clients, and ensures lending decisions are made with care and transparency.”

Another adviser, Jeremy Andrews from Key Mortgages, said banks could not discriminate based on age, but agreed they had to follow responsible lending rules.

“Often we see banks declining first-home buyers nearing retirement age loans that are similar or sometimes even lower than their rent payments.”

He said that was because, if someone needed a longer-loan term to make the loan affordable, they may have to stay in full-time work for the duration.

“That said, there are plenty of mitigants that banks can consider case by case, which are referred to as exit strategies.

“As part of a client’s affordability analysis, lenders and mortgage advisers should investigate and consider whether clients are in sedentary jobs and able to continue work beyond retirement age. Some banks can then consider up to 70 years of age, others longer.”

He said other things borrowers could think about were whether they could increase payments once dependents left home or clear other debts to increase their ability to pay off the home loan.

Loan Market adviser Karen Tatterson said lenders and advisers had a responsibility to ensure a client had repaid their loans by the time they retired, or that they had an exit strategy.

“As a general rule of thumb, banks consider 70 years of age as the end date to a loan term,” she said. “There are other considerations too – KiwiSaver, overseas superannuations and pensions, and the impact these will have in terms of repaying the loan, once they are able to access these funds.

“I understand, in many instances, the longer loan term is requested by clients for the purpose of keeping the loan repayments at a lower value for affordability reasons, but the risk of this must be discussed.

“The other consideration here is whether the clients received any advice regarding the risk of taking out a mortgage at their age, and were offered any income protection, mortgage protection or life insurance.

‘In my mind, this is an important aspect of the process and, in this instance, if the male partner had some life cover, this may have gone a long way to paying off all or part of the home loan.

“This would have made the ongoing home loan repayment affordable for the surviving partner.”

What you need to know if you’re applying for a home loan as an older borrower

• Have a plan – will you work until the loan is repaid or do you have another way to pay it off?
• Be prepared to have a shorter loan term
• Different lenders may have different approaches

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Source: Radio New Zealand

Retail chain Yoyoso has been placed into liquidation owing millions of dollars, and liquidators say it is unlikely unsecured creditors will get their money back.

The Yoyoso group includes the retail brands Yoyoso, Miniso and Acecco.

Liquidators McDonald Vague said when the chain went into liquidation there were eight shops trading around Auckland but those would close through this month.

“The liquidators have closed the Northcote supermarket (Acecco Supermarket Limited) location due to lack of trading revenue but continued to trade the Mt Albert location.

“The Yoyoso and Miniso stores have continued to trade to reduce the stock levels at each of the stores. As stock levels reduce and/or landlords make decisions on the timing of the stores closing the stores will be vacated and closed with the expectation to have almost all stores closed or vacated over January 2026.

“The staff in the trading entities will continue to be employed as needed to assist in trading down the group, along with a couple of day to day management staff.”

The liquidators say that about $217,000 is owed to former employees for wages, holiday pay and redundancy pay.

So far, $63,000 has been paid to bring wage payments up to date and employees should be paid their entitlements in full.

The liquidators said Inland Revenue was likely to be due $940,000 in GST, PAYE and other payroll deductions. They said they did not think Inland Revenue would get everything it was owed.

Unsecured creditors were due at least $2.1 million, they said, not including contingent claims from landlords or IRD penalties and interest. They might receive zero cents in the dollar, the liquidators said.

Retail consultant Chris Wilkinson, from First Retail Group, said it was part of a general trend in which shoppers looking for things that Yoyoso sold would shop on Temu, AliExpress or Shein instead.

“Generally novelty-type products, party products that people are now able to buy from the source and significantly cheaper. It’s product you don’t necessarily need, novelty activity.”

He said Yoyoso had been able to sustain a large physical presence in the centre of Auckland, on Queen Street, before the behaviour change took hold.

“You need significant volumes to drive business and it wouldn’t happen, it’s not possible under the new way of buying stuff.”

Retail NZ chief executive Carolyn Young said it showed how tough it was to be a retailer in New Zealand at the moment.

“It’s a reflection of the New Zealand trading market last year. The retail environment was really tough. This is just another demonstration … a few days ago EB Games announced their proposal for closure. Here’s another group where we’re seeing a nationwide business in liquidation.

“It demonstrates that businesses have held on and they’ve held on and they’ve held on but with no spare cash and trading at a loss you can only sustain that for a certain length of time. These businesses are not seeing the turnaround in the economy come quickly enough for them to survive.”

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Source: Radio New Zealand

A woman whose son blocked her transaction on an account, resulting in a hold being put on her money, has been awarded $10,000 in compensation from her bank.

The woman took her complaint to the Banking Ombudsman, which does not identify customers or the banks they complain about.

She opened accounts with the bank in 2021 and put $500,000 from the sale of a property into a term deposit.

Two years later, she went to a branch with her son, and asked that he was added to help her with her banking. She was 84 and had limited English.

She also gave him enduring power of attorney over her property.

A week later she opened a new account in her sole name and said any instructions from her son about the term deposits should be confirmed with her first.

She also raised a concern about her English signature being copied and asked the bank to use her Chinese signature.

In June 2024, she and her son asked the bank to send $250,000 from the term deposit to his Australian account and reinvested the rest.

Later that year, the woman and her daughter asked the bank to close the term deposit and put the money into her personal account.

Her son objected and the bank put a hold on the money.

The customer later revoked her son’s enduring power of attorney and appointed two of her daughters instead.

The Banking Ombudsman said she complained the bank had not properly explained the implications of joint account ownership and she thought she was giving her son access to her accounts as a signatory, rather than a full joint account holder. She said it was not her intention for him to be able to prevent her from accessing her own funds.

The ombudsman scheme said it had to consider whether the bank acted with reasonable care and skill when it added the son as a joint account-holder and when the woman returned to the branch later.

“The bank’s policy required staff to speak separately with the customer, explain the implications of joint ownership, and document the interaction,” it said in its case note.

“The bank’s policy was largely consistent with our expectations of what banks should do in this situation. However, the bank had kept limited documentary evidence about the steps it took to meet its obligations. We found there was no evidence that staff met separately with [the woman], explained the implications of what she proposed to do, or discussed other options such as using an authority to operate or power of attorney.”

It said she was in a vulnerable position because she relied on her son to translate and he benefited from the changes.

“The bank did not confirm that [she] understood the implications or that the instructions were her own. There was no evidence that the bank had any discussions with [her] regarding other options available to her, such as giving [him] the authority to operate her account, or adding him as an enduring power of attorney. We found the bank failed to act with reasonable care and skill.

“When [she] returned to the branch on two occasions a week later, she raised concerns about the joint account and her signature, but the bank did not follow up or take any action. We found the bank failed to meet its obligations to act with reasonable care and skill on both occasions.”

It said it could not say for sure what the woman would have done if the bank had acted appropriately initially.

“She trusted [her son] wanted him to help with her banking. When she visited the branch on two occasions a week later, we considered it likely [she] would have reassessed her banking arrangements if the bank had asked her about what she was trying to achieve by involving her son in her banking and then explaining in detail the various options available to her.

“What she would have done with this information is hard to say.”

The ombudsman said the bank should take some responsibility for the situation she was in.

She was unable to access her money and might need to take legal action to regain control of it.

The ombudsman recommended the bank pay $10,000, the maximum amount it could award for stress and inconvenience.

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Source: Radio New Zealand

If you’ve been hanging out for 2026 to be the year in which it gets a bit easier to go to the supermarket, you might be disappointed.

Infometrics has released its latest grocery supplier cost index, which tracks what suppliers charge Foodstuffs supermarkets.

It shows an average 2.4 percent increase in what was charged in December compared to a year earlier.

“The usual summer cost change moratorium limits the number of cost changes over December and January, with only more seasonal and perishable items seeing movement,” Infometrics chief executive Brad Olsen said.

Moratoriums are used to minimise system changes during peak trading periods, helping to reduce disruption for customers over the holidays.

“Higher seasonal supply saw some produce costs decline, while costs rose for some specific items, including potatoes and kiwifruit. Limited protein supply globally has continued to keep meat and seafood costs higher, but rising global milk supply has helped lower costs for milk, butter, and other dairy items.”

Olsen said supplier costs made up about two-thirds of the shelf price that shoppers paid.

Supplier costs rose across departments year-on-year in December, apart from a small fall in service deli.

“Larger cost increases for protein earlier in 2025 saw seafood and butchery costs rise the most, up 4.6 percent per annum over 2025. A pull-back in dairy costs moderated the rise in the chilled foods department to 2.5 percent.

“Higher costs for some fruits and vegetables, particularly potatoes, grapes, kiwifruit, and salads, pushed produce department costs up 2 percent per annum at the end of 2025.”

Olsen said food price rises had been quite targeted in 2025.

“The question for this year is less in a sense ‘will there be food price pressures’ and more, ‘will there be really intense food price pressures in certain areas?’

“By that I mean, will we see any relief globally in terms of protein costs? You’ve still seen the likes of beef and lamb that has been increasing significantly off the back of more limited supply of meat around the world – and here in New Zealand, to be fair. That’s been pushing up those prices. There’s nothing out there that suggests to me that the pressure is going to go away any time soon.”

He said people would be watching dairy prices closely, too, given the increases recorded last year.

“Dairy prices in general have pulled back quite a bit in the last couple of months.”

Some price rises, such as an increase in kiwifruit, were potentially good for the economy if they helped exporters.

“Barring any large changes, you’d be hoping that you’re not seeing as much headline-grabbing coming from food prices in 2026. But people will still, I think, naturally be quite focused on shopping either seasonally or trying to find the right way to structure their household budgets and their family meal planning because those cost increases have been so intense.

“I know looking through the supermarket myself, that it’s definitely more affordable to be buying pork or chicken than it is to be buying beef or lamb at the moment.”

Stats NZ will report on overall food prices on Friday.

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Source: Radio New Zealand

The co-owner of a new supermarket in Christchurch says shoppers have turned out in droves in support of the new store since it opened last week.

Ethan Vickery and his father Shane opened Kai Co to give shoppers an alternative to the Woolworths and Foodstuffs supermarket duopoly.

He said during the first three days since the store opened, sales nearly doubled their expectations.

Ethan Vickery said he and his father were drawing on their experience and contacts as former butchers, focusing on local markets and suppliers to ensure they were stocking fresh meat and produce at competitive prices.

“I think it’s something that is cheaper to be sourced locally. There’s no benefit being a big corporate and buying in bulk when it’s fresh food… and you do have that flexibility as well to get specials. The suppliers just can ring us directly and be like ‘we need to clear this stuff’ and you can take it,” Vickery said.

Vickery said the store was looking to widen it’s selection of products as suppliers warmed to the new business.

“No one really took us too seriously cause there’s nothing really like us that’s been done before.

“When we were talking to suppliers originally, they kind of thought we were sort of like a clearance place. But now they’ve seen what we are and they’ve come in – they think it’s a really nice store – they’ve all been approaching us,” Vickery said.

He said the store had taken a back-to-basics approach to keep the focus on quality food at an affordable price.

He said other attempts to break the duopoly had made the mistake of trying to compete against the chains at their own game.

“I think they’ve all tried to be too upmarket. They haven’t been cheap, they haven’t been solving a problem. The problem is the cost of living. All those places have been on the higher end. People just need good quality food at a good price.

“We’re not trying to be too fancy. We don’t have loyalty cards or anything like that it’s just simple, good quality food at a good price,” Vickery said.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand