Activist

ACTIVIST® is a Manuka honey company founded by husband and wife team Luke Harwood and Gabrielle Mirkin. Both have a shared passion for the earth and natural products can be traced to our childhoods in New Zealand.

Luke’s love for surfing and the native coastal land of New Zealand lead him to understand the important role bees play as environmental indicators and was the founding catalyst for ACTIVIST®. Gabrielle’s time in New York City
working as a senior Art Director at Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar led to a slowdown, and the pursuit of new interests outside of the fast-paced world of fashion publications. Gabrielle’s love for good health, mindfulness, travel and pure food was a central driver for the development of ACTIVIST®.

Based between California and New Zealand, we’ve built a natural and transparent company as an extension of our lifestyle. Our involvement is far-reaching: from establishing relationships with the bee-keepers to product innovation to building relationships with customers and global retailers. We believe it’s important that New Zealand and its products are represented authentically on a global scale, rather than sold off to international companies to be rebranded and diluted. If that means building a slower growing, sustainable business, that’s cool with us.