Comvita's Claude is a 100-year-old honey
18 Aug 2010
New Zealand’s honey for health pioneer, Claude Stratford, has turned 100 years old today (18.8.2010) - a walking advertisement for the natural bee products he’s made world famous.
With an interest that began at the age of three, Stratford has had a life-long affinity with honey products, and still remains at the helm of Comvita, the international health product business he started at age 64.
Today Comvita, which was meant to be Claude’s modest retirement venture, employs 250 staff, turns over NZ$85 million a year and exports to 14 countries around the world.
Official birthday milestone
Now living in a retirement home in the Bay of Plenty town of Te Puke, Claude Stratford’s 100-year milestone will be officially celebrated at a party in the Comvita Visitor Centre, in nearby Paengaroa, on Friday (20.8.10).
Claude, who lives by his own honey-for-health philosophy, has made sure he looks the part for the special occasion by hiring a pinstripe suit and selecting a bee-print tie.
His life-long devotion to honey bees and health will be honoured by 250 well wishers including family, friends, present and past staff members, and special guests from as far away as Europe and Asia.
Even on his 100th birthday, Claude didn’t miss the opportunity to remind media about the benefits of bee products, listing his daily health regimen of bee pollen, manuka honey, olive leaf extract, multi-vitamins and Omega 3 capsules. He also adds in Comvita elixir for treating coughs and sore throats.
Comvita origins
The origins of the successful Comvita company date back to 1974 when Claude retired to the Bay of Plenty and began making and selling a range of bee products from the basement of his home in Paengaroa.
His idea was to help others - with a founding vision that included "caring for the community, producing natural products that work, and acting in a way which preserves the environment for generations to come".
Comvita’s natural honeybee products were alternative to other products available in the market at that time and as a result, Claude was regarded as somewhat of a mad scientist who used to spend hours with a blender and his honey.
His other products such as wholemeal flour and natural sea salt were also pioneering, and it was many more years before they became mainstream products in New Zealand.
Co-founder and director of Comvita, Alan Bougen, who approached Claude for a job in his 20s, said his business partner seemed to have been born a couple of generations too early.
"He was selling health foods when most people wouldn’t have even heard the term," said Bougen.
First beehive
Claude’s fascination with bees started as a three year old, when he had his first beehive on his parents’ property in Picton, at the top of the South Island.
At 11, he left school to become a commercial beekeeper. He would take the ferry across Cook Strait to Wellington each day to sell his honey on the condition that he was home for dinner. At one stage he also ran a prize-winning stud poultry farm in his hometown of Richmond, near Nelson.
While bee-keeping was a constant in his career, Claude had a variety of jobs including stints working on Auckland’s waterfont, driving taxis, selling insurance, growing comfrey, milling flour and working for Healtheries products.
He developed apiary businesses in the Waikato and Peria Valley in Northland, but moved to the Bay of Plenty in 1974 to be nearer his children.
Export earnings
From the early beginnings of the Comvita company, Claude recognised the importance of the overseas markets and began shipping products to Japan from day one.
Exports took off in the late 1980s and early 1990s when Comvita was launched into Britain, Singapore, the United States, Hong Kong and Australia.
Claude recalls that in the early days when Comvita’s income hit NZ$1 million a month the staff would celebrate by going off jet boating or having a party. "Now of course we’re doing $6 to $9 million a month," says Claude.
As well as his phenomenal achievements and business success, Claude has been married five times and had his share of life tragedies.
He lost his first wife during the birth of their fourth child, who also died. Two of Claude’s adult daughters also died, one in 1989 and the other in 1991.
Total Value Health
As if starting one health company in his retirement wasn’t enough, in 1992 at aged 88, Claude started a new business called Total Value Health Foods - a small pollen processing firm that supplied Comvita.
At the ripe old age of 95 he was nominated as a finalist for the 2005 Entrepreneur of the Year award for Comvita. In addition, Comvita won the Environment Bay of Plenty Sustainable Business Supreme Award in 2006.
In 1999, Claude was awarded the Queens Service Medal (QSM) for his services to the community, largely for the work conducted through his charitable trust.
He continues to support philanthropic projects in New Zealand and overseas in-keeping with his philosophy that businesses should give back to the community.
Claude says he didn't know what it was to be well until his mid-30s.
"Around the ages 24 to 26 I suffered a lot of ill-health - I was just generally run-down - and when I was about 26 I read a book on pollen remedies by Marjorie McCormick called ‘The Golden Pollen’.
"I started producing and consuming bee pollen at that stage and I've been taking it for the last 80 years."
At 96 he was still driving and working up to six days a week, but he’s now a true retiree who spends his days listening to the radio.
Claude Stratford's 'Top 10 tips for living well':
- A tablespoon of bee pollen every day.
- A daily teaspoon of Comvita Manuka honey and a dose of Comvita Olive Leaf Extract (15 ml), two Omega 3 capsules (fish oil) and a multivitamin tablet.
- Generosity of spirit.
- A drive to help others.
- An unswerving belief in the power of nature to provide a source of healing for people.
- Being prepared to dream big dreams and treat any setbacks along the way as mere challenges that can be overcome.
- Accepting people as they are and believing the best of them.
- Persistence and at times - dogged determination: "If at first you don't succeed then try, try, try again!
- Faith and prayer.
- Read widely, keep up with the latest information about the things that interest you and have an open mind.
Tips for relaxing in NZ
Asked if he could add some thoughts on relaxation to his list of tips for living well, Claude said his favourite part of New Zealand was the Bay of Plenty region where he has lived for the past 40 years.
Comvita co-founder Alan Bougen who worked with Claude for 36 years, said Claude was basically a workaholoic who very rarely relaxed. but on the odd occasion when he could be persuaded to leave the office, Claude liked to visit Mt Maunganui Hot Salt Water Pools at the base of the Mount, or drive to Maketu to the beach.
Comvita for visitors
Comvita’s headquarters today is a very different set up to the one Claude Stratford operated from the garage of his home in the same small town of Paengaroa near Te Puke, 30 years ago.
Today the company’s multi-million dollar operation is slick and streamlined with up-to-the-minute systems and modern premises which includes a spacious visitor centre.
As well as shopping and sampling from vibrant displays of Comvita’s extensive product collection, visitors can watch bees at work in live bee hives.
Educational tours explain the process from raw material to final product covering Comvita’s story from the shipment overseas of the first jar of manuka honey.
Sampling honey and enjoying health foods from the centre’s café have become a popular pastime with locals and tourists - with many tour operators choosing the centre as a point-of-interest stop off in the Bay of Plenty.
The Comvita Visitor Centre achieved the prestigious Green Globe Benchmark Bronze status in 2008, recognising a commitment to operate to the world’s highest environmental standard.
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