Insprie Labs, New Zealand, Australia and the United States, with international growth capability
Businesses rarely have twenty problems.They usually have one constraint creating twenty symptoms.
Insprie works alongside founders, boards and management teams to identify the constraint holding performance back, fix it, and build the capability required for what comes next.
Experience at a glance
- 40+
- Years
- Combined operating, entrepreneurial and leadership experience
- US$65M+
- Capital deployed
- Deployed by Insprie principals since 2021
- NZ$140M+
- Current business revenue exposure
- Annualised revenue across current operating, governance and investment interests
- 20+
- International markets
- Reached by businesses built and led by the team
- 4,000+
- Retail doors reached
- Global retail footprint reached by brands built and led by the team
The constraint
The symptoms are rarely the problem.
The visible problem is often downstream of the real constraint.
Demand is often the first place performance shows up and the last place it is created. Range, pricing, availability, channel economics and proposition clarity all surface as a sales number.
Usually involves Demand · Product · Direction
Who we are
Insprie is a senior operating partner for ambitious consumer businesses. We work alongside founders, leadership teams, boards and investors on the work that decides whether a business grows, recovers or stalls.
Strategy + Talent + Execution. We bring the capability a business needs at the stage it is at, and stay involved through execution rather than handing over a document.
More involved than an adviser. More accountable than a consultant.
What we do
Eight consumer capabilities, delivered by one senior team.
Consumer businesses rarely have a single problem. We work across the disciplines that determine performance, and apply them in combination rather than in isolation.
Strategy & Transformation
Set the direction. Make the difficult decisions. Turn strategy into action.
02Brand & Consumer
Build brands, products and propositions customers actively choose.
03Growth & Performance Marketing
Turn attention, customers and marketing investment into measurable growth.
04Operations & Supply Chain
Build the operational foundations required to scale reliably and profitably.
05Finance & Commercial Performance
Improve visibility, cash, margins and commercial decision-making.
06People & Leadership
Put the right leadership, structure and capability around the business.
07Sales, Retail & International Growth
Open new channels, customers and markets.
08Capital, Investment & M&A
Prepare, fund, acquire and create long-term value.
The Insprie rhythm
How an engagement unfolds.
Every engagement is different. The sequence below is indicative, not prescriptive, offered so founders and boards know what to expect if a conversation progresses.
01
First conversation
Confidential. No obligation. We listen.
02
Diligence
Commercial, operational and cultural review.
03
Participation
Structure agreed. Capital, roles and scope defined.
04
Operating involvement
We work inside the business on agreed areas of execution.
05
Exit
A stronger, more valuable business, prepared for its next chapter.
- 01
First conversation
Confidential. No obligation. We listen.
- 02
Diligence
Commercial, operational and cultural review.
- 03
Participation
Structure agreed. Capital, roles and scope defined.
- 04
Operating involvement
We work inside the business on agreed areas of execution.
- 05
Exit
A stronger, more valuable business, prepared for its next chapter.
How we work
Four ways to engage an Insprie operating partner.
The right structure depends on the situation, the pace required and how much of the work the business needs us to carry.
Advisory
Senior Insprie people working alongside boards, founders and leadership teams on important strategic and commercial issues.
Projects
We take responsibility for defined business outcomes.
Embedded Leadership
Sometimes a business does not need another consultant. It needs an experienced person inside the business.
Investment & Partnership
For a small number of businesses where there is strong strategic alignment, Insprie may invest capital and work alongside the founders as a long-term partner.
Situations we solve
Situations we solve for consumer businesses.
Most conversations start with a specific problem rather than a service line. These are the ones we are asked about most.
Our work
Our work with consumer and CPG brands.
Client work is confidential. These anonymised notes describe the situation, the work and the result, and are published only where the business has cleared them.
Situation note 01
Personal care, New Zealand
Performance improvement
Margin recovered, working capital released from slow-moving stock, and the business able to hold its retail listings without discounting.
Situation note 02
Sustainable consumer products, Australasia
International expansion
A deliberate, margin-led market entry replaced an opportunistic one, with a permanent leadership team in place at handover.
INS/OS
Business performance is a system.
Direction, demand, product, delivery, economics and organisation are connected. Improving one dimension while ignoring the constraint elsewhere often makes the problem worse.
01 / Direction
Where are we going, and what matters?
What the business is trying to do, and what it has decided not to do.
Typical symptoms
- Everything is a priority
- Board and management are not aligned
- Resources are spread across too many initiatives
- Strategy exists on paper but not in the plan
Constraints underneath
- No agreed definition of what the business is optimising for
- Market and channel choices never narrowed
- Capital and attention allocated by history rather than by return
- Decisions escalate rather than resolve
What we deploy
- Strategy reset
- Priority sequencing
- Resource and capital allocation
- Board and shareholder alignment
Intelligence
Situation Notes.
Short, practical notes on the situations we are brought into, written for founders, boards and investors rather than for search engines.
The Insprie network
The right people, when they matter.
Rather than maintaining a large consultancy structure, we bring senior specialists into a business by situation, as short-term specialists, fractional executives, interim leaders or permanent appointments.
- Finance
- Performance marketing
- Ecommerce
- Brand
- Supply chain
- Manufacturing
- Technology
- Data
- Sales
- International expansion
- Leadership
- Regulatory
- Legal
- Investment
AmCham New Zealand, Auckland
End to end
From formulation and brand creation through to manufacturing, retail and scale.
We work across the full value chain of a consumer business, product and formulation, brand and packaging, supply and manufacturing, channel and retail execution, and the commercial disciplines that decide whether growth is profitable.
Formulation and product
Product development, cost of goods and specification
Brand and packaging
Positioning, identity, structural and graphic design
Manufacturing and supply
Sourcing, production, quality and freight
Retail and channel
Range architecture, buyer strategy and execution
Categories we know
Beauty and personal care
Formulation, format and pack economics
Home and cleaning
Refill models, concentrates and freight cost
Vitamins and wellness
Claims, dosing formats and regulatory fit
Food and beverage
Compliance, shelf life and channel fit
Built for volume, New Zealand, Australia and the United States
Capability at a glance
Depth across the disciplines that decide performance.
- 8
- Capability areas
- Strategy through to capital
- 4
- Ways to engage
- Advisory, projects, embedded leadership, investment
- 25+
- Years of consumer operating experience
- Across the leadership team
- AU, US, UK
- Priority export markets
- Plus selected Asian markets
For founders earlier in the journey
Free tools, courses and playbooks from people who have built consumer businesses.
Business But Better is a free education hub founded by Insprie managing partner Brianne West, drawing on the experience of building and selling Ethique. Written for ambitious, mission-led consumer founders, no paywall, no sales pitch.
Start a conversation
Tell us what you are building, or what is not working.
We meet founders, leadership teams, boards, investors and advisers with ambitions in consumer. A first conversation costs nothing and commits no one.