Ecostore group CEO Pablo Kraus, PM Jacinda Ardern and Minister for Trade and Export Growth Damien O’Connor did the honours.
Ecostore, an established sustainability leader in home cleaning and personal care products in New Zealand, is once again expanding its global impact, this time in Vietnam.
Group CEO Pablo Kraus attended the official launch of ecostore’s first flagship store in Ho Chi Minh City. He was helped to open the store by New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, currently assisting a trade delegation to Vietnam, who cut the ribbon.
Kraus says Vietnamese consumers are increasingly embracing and demanding sustainability, and there is a growing emphasis on purchasing sustainably-made and environmentally-friendly products, such as those made by ecostore, among families in Vietnam.
“Sustainability has been a growing topic of interest to Vietnamese consumers in recent years and is increasingly top of mind for the growing middle-class demographic in Vietnam, for whom family is the most important aspect of life and who deeply value care for their children.
“Our ecostore values align with international perception of New Zealand: caring for people, connection to place, integrity, trust, and safety. We have been on a mission to help families care for their homes, their health, and the world for almost 30 years – long before it was a ‘trend’.”
Kraus says Vietnamese consumers are increasingly expecting businesses to focus on environmental protection more than profit, noting that ‘planet before profit’ is at the heart of ecostore’s philosophy.
The new flagship will offer an in-store refillery, which will enable customers to bring their own packaging to refill with ecostore products. Although ecostore has been offering refilleries in New Zealand for 20 years and now has 200 refilleries worldwide, it is a relatively new concept for the Vietnam market and is designed to fulfil the increasing demand from environment-conscious group Vietnamese consumers who are seeking to reduce plastic waste, recycling, and opt for healthier, sustainable lifestyles.
According to a Kantar report, environmental issues such as plastic waste, water pollution and air pollution are among the top five concerns of Vietnamese in addition to food safety.
Ecostore was founded in 1993 by Malcolm and Melanie Rands: it has grown from its humble beginnings as a mail-order business based in an eco-village in Northland, New Zealand into a business which now operates in more than 15 markets worldwide, including Japan, Korea, China, and Singapore, in addition to its home markets of New Zealand and Australia.
The company first launched in Asia in 2014 and has been in the Vietnamese market since 2020, selling online and through premium retailers. The opening of the flagship was delayed due to Covid.
Having opened their first ecostore flagship store in Auckland, New Zealand in 1997, the leading sustainability brand offers products ranging from body and baby care to home care. The company is focused on continuing to expand the footprint of its refill stations and reducing its reliance on water in its formulations, with innovations such as concentrated cleaning refills and solid haircare bars.