The husband & wife team behind New Zealand’s hottest new homewares brand

When you call customer service at premium homeware, furniture and bedding brand Home Lab,  you may be surprised to find yourself speaking directly to either one of the two owners, husband and wife team Ben and Annelies Leitch.

“It’s actually our strength at the moment,” says Ben. “By keeping it just the two of us, we just don’t have those big overheads, which means that we can supply premium products and keep price points down.”

For Annelies and Ben, the journey from full-time employment in the corporate world, shuttling two young kids back and forth to daycare, to owning a successful online homewares business and working remotely has been a monumentally positive shift. 

For some, such a huge leap of faith might have seemed risky, but between the pair they have the ideal skill sets to run a successful online homewares brand. Ben’s background is in IT, and Annelies worked in fashion in product management before moving into homewares buying and brand development. This was where she saw the opportunity to deliver high quality homewares, furniture and bedding at an accessible price point. 

“I could see what we were currently doing with the other brands that I was working with and recognised the opportunity to become a real brand and work with trade customers like interior designers, as well as making natural bed linen and high quality products available to more New Zealanders.”

Before launching just over three years ago, the online-only brand came to the attention of some big-name high-end retailers thanks to Annelies’ astute brand positioning, and was picked up by Smith & Caugheys stores, Flo & Frankie, Ballantynes in Christchurch and Father Rabbit in Auckland. 

As an online-only brand, having a retail presence allows the public to purchase the products in person and for designers to get a feel for the quality of the product ranges. 

Initially, Home Lab’s offering was solely 100% flax linen, but soon expanded to premium designer furniture, 100% cotton bed linen and more recently, high-end glassware. Annelies says customers are conscious of the quality of what they’re buying, but also don’t want to spend the earth to get it. 

“Our business model means we are keeping prices down, while also offering people really nice quality products without compromising on materials and manufacturing.”

Home Lab’s furniture ranges have been a huge success, and Ben puts this down to the fact that the products are designed in New Zealanders for the Kiwi lifestyle, as well as the fact that customers can rely on quick delivery – the company’s warehouse in Penrose, Auckland, holds a large amount of stock. 

“This means that when customers order the products they don’t have huge wait times which is a common issue with some suppliers,” shares Ben. 

Recently, Home Lab also brought on a few Kiwi furniture suppliers who are aligned with the high-quality ethos of the brand, and they have plans to further expand furniture, linen and glassware ranges into the future. 

“The ranges keep getting bigger and bigger and our linen colour selection keeps growing,” shares Annelies. “We’ve just launched a few new collections in that product category and we’re excited to see where it goes.”

In spite of the challenges of the economic recession, the future of the company looks bright, with plans to set up a warehouse over the ditch and expand into the Australian market. By working remotely, the couple can keep their operations in Auckland, while enjoying the perks of the self-employed lifestyle.

“We’re working really hard to grow the brand, but we’ve resisted expanding too quickly as this is inherently what makes our products more accessible to a wider-range of design-led customers,” says Annelies. “We figure out better ways of doing things because we can’t do it all and that’s what makes Home Lab unique.”

Explore stunning linen, furniture and glassware from Home Lab