Company Ownership

In 1950 Mr Salter bought is own garage and transferred his shares to the other two directors.  Mr McKenzie resigned in 1963, selling his shares to Mr Godfrey. Mr Godfrey says Mr McKenzie was the “ideas” man. His 1992 obituary says that, besides designing NZ Lumber’s early forklifts, he designed Bay Park Speedway, held original patents for the guided Adelaide bus system, and was a writer and painter.

From carting and marshalling sawn timber, NZ Lumber rapidly expanded its operations into bulk exports, including logs, creosote, sawn timber, wood chips, steel, wool, dairy products, concrete products, fertiliser and many more. In 1974, a large proportion of the company’s business was dairy products. Rapid expansion meant the need for more equipment and required an equity partner. Twenty five thousand shares were sold to Anchor Milk Supplies Limited and an additional 14,000 shares in 1975.

The growth in exports and new wharf development at Mount Maunganui encouraged the Shipping Corporation of NZ to look for a local agency and in 1983 it became a shareholder of NZ Lumber.

In 1986 NZ Lumber was owned jointly by New Zealand Cooperative Dairy Company, The Shipping Corporation of New Zealand and Freightways Group. In 1987 Freightways Group’s shares were transferred to Freightways Express (a joint venture with NZ Rail).

When the Shipping Corporation was to be sold by the government, it disposed of peripheral investments including NZ Lumber. It sold its shares to the two other shareholders. In 1992 the company’s registered name officially changed to NZL Group although this trade name was used since 1988. P&O Ports purchased NZL Group in October 1993.

When P & O put NZL Group up for sale in 2006 3 New Zealand investment groups joined together, stepped up and grabbed this exciting opportunity. With one investment group entirely made up of NZL Group Senior Managers returning NZL Group to 100% kiwi owned and operated was an opportunity too good to turn down.