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Speaker 1: At one hundred million dollars. This is probably New Zealand's

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Speaker 1: most expensive startup and today Recorp has finally started up.

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Speaker 1: It's opened its new aluminium facility. Now the company wants

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Speaker 1: to become a big player in the packaging industry, focusing

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Speaker 1: on aluminium cans and also bottles, and it's attracted big

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Speaker 1: name investors like Annamobraid, the rich lister and former and

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Speaker 1: New Zealand executive Rob Fife, who is actually the chair

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Speaker 1: and is with us now, Hey, Rob, Hi, Heather, Rob

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Speaker 1: this one. We have been following this story for such

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Speaker 1: a long time.

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Speaker 2: It feels like it's been such a long It has

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Speaker 2: been so long in the works, I mean, to be fair,

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Speaker 2: help me longer for you than for me, because you've

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Speaker 2: been there from the outset outset, so you must be

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Speaker 2: stoked to get the thing opened.

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Speaker 1: When do you do your first runner cans?

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Speaker 3: We've actually already done our first run, so over the

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Speaker 3: last week or two we've produced about one and a

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Speaker 3: half million cans, which is just to get going. But

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Speaker 3: you know, it kind of feels pretty elated to have

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Speaker 3: the official opening today, But at the same time it's

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Speaker 3: relief as much as anything else. Why relie. Well. You know,

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Speaker 3: for anyone that's built a house, you pour money into

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Speaker 3: a hole in the ground for a long long time.

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Speaker 3: It's really only at the final stage that it takes

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Speaker 3: shape and you kind of get a sense of what

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Speaker 3: that had hard work is going to realize in terms

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Speaker 3: of the end result. And this project's been like that.

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Speaker 3: And I've been going for three years a lot of money,

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Speaker 3: and it's you know, it's kind of just in the

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Speaker 3: last couple of months finally you kind of see this

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Speaker 3: whole thing taking shape and there's product coming out at

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Speaker 3: the end, and it's like, wow, now we can actually

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Speaker 3: get out there and start making a difference.

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Speaker 1: And making some money. The first one and a half

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Speaker 1: billion cans have they been sold.

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Speaker 3: They have so pretty much everything we make is specific

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Speaker 3: to order for customers. And the challenge with this plant

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Speaker 3: in New Zealand, you know, you buy all the all

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Speaker 3: the plant equipment from offshore and offshore markets. You know,

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Speaker 3: if you're in the US and you're making cans for

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Speaker 3: I don't know, Budweiser, then you know they'll do a

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Speaker 3: run of a million or two million cans at a time.

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Speaker 3: We was here in the New Zealand market, you know,

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Speaker 3: it was so small, so you know, Behemoth might want

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Speaker 3: thirty thousand cans at a time, or garage project wants

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Speaker 3: sixty thousand, and the equipment isn't traditionally been set up to

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Speaker 3: do really short runs efficiently. So we've had to design

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Speaker 3: this plant in a way that isn't like any other

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Speaker 3: plant in the world, and that's created a lot of

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Speaker 3: complexity and all sorts of challenges. But we'll solve those

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Speaker 3: challenges and we've built a plant that's specifically designed for

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Speaker 3: the scale of the New Zealand marketplace and we're pretty

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Speaker 3: excited about that.

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Speaker 1: It's a bit of a time to be opening a

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Speaker 1: plant like this with manufacturing shutting down all over the

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Speaker 1: place because of power prices.

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Speaker 3: Did that worry you, Yeah, yeah, it did worry So,

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Speaker 3: you know, it's one of the topics we discussed with

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Speaker 3: the Prime Minister. In our first year of operation. I

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Speaker 3: think we'll spend probably five times more on electricity then

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Speaker 3: we'll spend on starf half cost and the plant for example.

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Speaker 3: So we're very sensitive to both electricity in guests. So

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Speaker 3: it is a concern and they're not issues that are

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Speaker 3: going to be solved in the short term, but you know,

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Speaker 3: I do believe that the government is committing to putting

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Speaker 3: us on a path where we're going to increase our

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Speaker 3: capacity over the coming years.

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Speaker 1: When you said putting us on a path, you mean

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Speaker 1: the entire country on a path, the.

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Speaker 3: Entire entire country, you know, looking at how we can

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Speaker 3: invest in more renewables, and clearly you know they're having

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Speaker 3: a close look at what we can do with natural

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Speaker 3: guests and so on.

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Speaker 1: Now, you Robert also involved in me. You've got your

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Speaker 1: fingers in a lot of pies, but you're also involved

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Speaker 1: at Craiggie Range Winery. Are you worried about those promised

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Speaker 1: tariffs from Donald Trump?

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Speaker 3: You know, we're a small trading nation that relies a

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Speaker 3: lot on market access. You kind of have to see

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Speaker 3: the full picture, right He's talking about increasing terrorists, but

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Speaker 3: at the same time he's talking about text cuts domestically,

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Speaker 3: So ultimately it's all about affordability. And you know the

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Speaker 3: advantage we have is New Zealand. You know, our biggest

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Speaker 3: wine export into the US is sauvignon blanc. The Californians

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Speaker 3: have been trying to replicate the flavor of the wines

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Speaker 3: we produce in New Zealand here for some time and

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Speaker 3: just haven't been able to kind of crack that nut.

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Speaker 3: So I'm confident ultimately that you know, if you love

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Speaker 3: a New Zealand Soavon blanc and the price goes up

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Speaker 3: by you know, however many dollars, does that mean you're

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Speaker 3: going to stop drinking that wine and drink something you

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Speaker 3: don't like it?

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Speaker 1: Probably not?

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Speaker 3: Probably not so, particularly if you've had particularly if you've

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Speaker 3: had text cuts and you've got more disposable income and

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Speaker 3: your wallet and so on. So I think we've got

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Speaker 3: to be optimistic and back ourselves that will kind of

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Speaker 3: be able to adapt to whatever whatever regime unfolds.

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Speaker 1: And also you have to believe he's actually going to

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Speaker 1: do it right. And the thing that you keep hearing

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Speaker 1: about him is he's extremely transactional, and he can be

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Speaker 1: talked out of things, because, for example, he gave us

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Speaker 1: the steel tariffs, but he was talked out of giving

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Speaker 1: Ossie the steel tariffs. So if we if we hit

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Speaker 1: him really hard diplomatically, we may be able to get

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Speaker 1: out of it.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I agree with that. I think you know, I

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Speaker 3: heard when some Peter's on earlier on your program, you know,

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Speaker 3: and I think the way that at a political level

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Speaker 3: that we play the next you know, three four or

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Speaker 3: five months is going to be absolutely critical in terms

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Speaker 3: of how we set ourselves up to manage this scenario.

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Speaker 3: And you know, there's some countries I'm being listening to

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Speaker 3: some of the commentary today, there's some countries that are

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Speaker 3: clearly on the back foot because of positions have taken

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Speaker 3: against them, you know, the president or about to be president.

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Speaker 3: And I think in that regard, I think we're in

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Speaker 3: a pretty good position here in New Zealand.

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Speaker 1: I reckon you're right reason to be optimistic. Hey, Rob,

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Speaker 1: thank you very much. Oh by the way, what should

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Speaker 1: I go and buy? If I want to get my

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Speaker 1: hands on a recorp can? What should I be buying?

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Speaker 3: Well, Garatge Project. One of our first customers Behemoth give

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Speaker 3: in to some of that great New Zealand craft beer.

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Speaker 3: Great place to start.

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Speaker 1: Okay, you're telling a pregnant lady to drink beer, so

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Speaker 1: we'll just we'll just remember that, Rob. They do some

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Speaker 1: zero alcohol ones at Garage Project. Hey, thanks Rob, look

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Speaker 1: after yourself. The Shrob five Recorp Chair Strategic Advisor at

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Speaker 1: Craigie Range Winery as well. For more from Hither Duplessy

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Speaker 1: Allen Drive. Listen live to news talks. It'd be from

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Speaker 1: four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio