What It Really Takes To Build A Global Beauty Brand, According To Antipodes Founder Elizabeth Barbalich
the brains behind the beauty products
By Victoria Lewis | 17th June 2026It was a background in science, combined with a passion for sustainability and natural ingredients, that saw Elizabeth Barbalich build the now-global beauty brand Antipodes from the ground up more than two decades ago. From her kitchen table to major stockists like Myer, Priceline Pharmacy, and David Jones, Elizabeth has grown her clean beauty brand into one of New Zealand‘s biggest beauty exports. Yet throughout its growth, she has stayed true to her values, remaining committed to the principles of sustainability and clean beauty amid a beauty landscape increasingly dominated by harsh chemicals, fast-moving trends, and fad social media marketing.
We spoke to Elizabeth about how she built her beauty empire for the long game, the process of creating a sustainable brand, and the 20-year journey behind launching Antipodes’ new haircare range.
You launched Antipodes from your kitchen table in 2004, long before ‘clean beauty’ became such a global movement. What originally pushed you to take that leap?
The idea came from a very personal frustration. I was looking for skincare that was natural, beautiful, and scientifically credible, and I couldn’t find anything that truly satisfied all three. At the time, natural beauty was still a very different category – it was sincere and well-intentioned, but it wasn’t really speaking the language of luxury, performance, or modern formulation. I had a science background, but I was also living a very nature-focused life in New Zealand with my young family. I didn’t want to compromise on purity, sustainability, or results. So Antipodes really began with a question: could natural skincare be as efficacious, and as desirable, as the conventional luxury brands I admired? I believed it could, and I wanted to prove it.
Before Antipodes, you worked in the medical and surgical technology space. How did your background in science shape the way you approached beauty and product development?
My early career gave me a very practical respect for evidence. I understood that natural ingredients needed to be treated with the same rigour as any other active ingredient – not just admired for where they came from, but studied for what they could do. So when I began formulating skincare, I wanted to understand how ingredients behaved, how they interacted with the skin, how a formulation performed as a whole, and how we could validate those results.
Science gave me a framework for taking nature seriously – not as a trend or a marketing idea, but as something that could be tested, refined and proven. Science gives nature a language – and it gives customers confidence.
You’ve built Antipodes into one of New Zealand’s most recognised beauty exports. Looking back now, were there any moments where you nearly gave up or questioned whether it would work?
There were certainly hard moments. In the early years, everything went back into the business. I had to be extremely cash-conscious, take a very low salary, and be prepared to do any job that needed doing. You can’t be precious in a start-up. But I don’t think I ever truly wanted to give up. I had spent two years researching and planning before launching a single product, including close analysis of global markets in France, the UK, and Australia. That gave me conviction.
I also spent weekends in-store, talking directly to customers about their skin, the ingredients, and the products. Those conversations were invaluable. When you hear from people face to face, it reminds you why you started. I’ve also really valued friendships with other women who understand the reality of building a business over many years. Lorna Jane Clarkson is one of those people. There is a real mutual respect there because we both understand the resilience, discipline and stamina it takes to keep showing up for a brand year after year.
Antipodes has always balanced nature with scientific validation. Why was it important to you that the brand felt grounded in both worlds, rather than just marketing?
I never saw nature and science as opposites. To me, science is the way we understand nature more deeply. New Zealand has extraordinary botanicals, but it was important that we didn’t rely on their origin story alone. I wanted to show what they could actually do for the skin.
From the beginning, my vision was to create natural skincare that felt luxurious but also had real credibility behind it. That meant working with cosmetic scientists, pharmacists, and researchers, investing in formulation expertise, and being willing to test, refine, and prove our products. Marketing can tell a beautiful story, but science gives that story substance. For me, the most exciting part of Antipodes has always been that meeting point – where nature provides the inspiration, and science helps us understand, validate, and elevate it.
Sustainability has been part of the Antipodes DNA from the beginning, long before many brands were having those conversations. Why was that so important to you from day one?
It was never a trend for me. It came from the way I wanted to live and the kind of company I wanted to build. I was focused on a natural and healthy lifestyle for myself and my family, and I didn’t want the business to create unnecessary waste or compromise the environment that inspired it.
One of the earliest decisions I made was to use glass jars for our moisturisers instead of plastic. That was not the easiest or cheapest option, but it aligned with my values. The world doesn’t need more waste. Sustainability only means something if it shows up in the decisions you make when no one is forcing you to make them.
What’s something people misunderstand about building a sustainable beauty brand today?
I think people sometimes underestimate how many decisions sustainability touches. It is not just packaging, although packaging is very important. It is also sourcing, manufacturing, formulation choices, supplier relationships, and the pace at which you create new products.
For me, sustainability is also about building something enduring. There is a model in beauty now where brands can become enormous almost overnight through celebrity, social media, or TikTok momentum, but that is not always the same as building something with longevity. If a brand appears quickly, produces at scale, and disappears just as quickly, that has an environmental cost too. I’ve always believed in the long game. Antipodes has grown customer by customer, retailer by retailer, over more than twenty years.
That slower path is not always glamorous, but it means you build infrastructure, relationships, and formulations with real substance behind them. To me, a sustainable beauty brand is one that considers its impact carefully, creates products with purpose, and is still here years later – not just part of a moment, but part of people’s lives.
Earlier this year, Antipodes entered the haircare space following years of research and development. What made now feel like the right time to expand beyond skincare?
Haircare had been on my mind for a long time, but I didn’t want to enter the category until we could do it properly. It took nearly ten years of research and development, not because the opportunity wasn’t there, but because natural haircare ingredients needed to become as exciting and effective as the ingredients we had been working with in skincare.
What changed was the quality of the bioactives coming into the market. We could finally bring a skincare-level approach to hair and scalp health – with professional-grade natural formulations that felt luxurious, performed beautifully, and stayed true to our philosophy. The scalp is skin, so for us it made sense to treat haircare with the same seriousness as skincare.
The new haircare range focuses heavily on bioactives, botanicals, and visible results. What were you most determined to achieve differently within the category?
I wanted to bring a skincare philosophy to haircare. We’re all much more educated now about ingredients, actives, and the skin barrier, but haircare has not always been approached with the same level of rigour. For me, the scalp is skin, and the hair fibre itself needs intelligent care, not just cosmetic coating.
Natural haircare can be difficult because people still expect softness, shine, slip, fragrance, and visible results. I was determined that we wouldn’t compromise on that sensorial experience, but we also wouldn’t rely on ingredients such as silicones, SLS/SLES, parabens, or artificial fragrance to get there. So the focus became bioactives and botanicals that could support the scalp and strands in a meaningful way. Ingredients such as Peruvian black maca, Atlantic seaweed extract, safflower oleosomes, New Zealand avocado oil, harakeke flax gel, and mānuka honey, plus Australian Kakadu plum and lime caviar, gave us a way to think about hair from scalp to strand.
Atlantic seaweed (Pelvetia canaliculata) is a good example of that thinking. I was fascinated by the way it survives in such a harsh environment – drying out at low tide, then rehydrating when the ocean returns. That resilience and ability to retain moisture felt incredibly relevant to hair. It is exactly the kind of natural intelligence I’m always looking for: an ingredient with a beautiful origin story, but also a clear reason for being in the formula.
You’ve spoken previously about becoming more conscious of harsh chemicals after having your children. How much did motherhood influence both your perspective on wellness and the direction of the brand?
Motherhood was hugely influential. Having children makes you look more closely at the choices you make every day – what you eat, what you put on your skin, what you bring into your home. At the same time, those early years made me realise how much I needed intellectual stimulation and a creative challenge of my own. I wanted to build something that used every part of my brain – science, nature, wellness, design, and business. Antipodes became the place where all of those interests came together with a real purpose.
Beauty trends move fast. How do you protect the integrity of Antipodes while still evolving with the industry?
You need to know what you stand for. Trends can be useful because they show you what people are curious about, but they should not dictate your values or your product development. I have always believed that good ideas need patience. Rushing rarely produces the best result. For us, integrity comes from clear principles: natural formulations, scientific validation, sustainable thinking, ethical sourcing, and a strong New Zealand identity. We can evolve within those principles, but we don’t abandon them because the market is moving quickly. Longevity matters more to me than chasing noise.
The essence has not changed. Antipodes began with the belief that natural skincare could be high-performance, beautiful, and scientifically credible, and that still guides every decision. Innovation only makes sense when it strengthens that idea. I stay curious. I read, research, ask questions, and surround myself with people who know their fields deeply. I’m fascinated by how ingredients behave, how plants survive and adapt, and how small formulation changes can transform the way a product performs. Trends move quickly, but curiosity and rigour are more enduring. They keep the brand moving forward without losing its centre.
After more than two decades building the business, what still excites you most about the industry today, and what’s next for Antipodes?
What still excites me is that there is always more to learn. Even after more than twenty years, I still feel there are new ingredients to discover, new technologies to understand, and new ways to support skin and hair health. That curiosity keeps the work interesting. For Antipodes, haircare is a very exciting new chapter, but it is still connected to the same philosophy we began with. We will continue to develop high-performance natural formulations, grounded in New Zealand nature, and supported by science. I’m interested in products that feel luxurious, but also have genuine purpose – formulas that earn their place in someone’s daily routine.
With unwavering drive, passion, and curiosity, Elizabeth finds herself more than two decades into Antipodes and shows no signs of slowing down any time soon. I think it’s her belief in earning a place in people’s daily beauty routines that is particularly striking. As a founder dedicated to long-term skin and hair care solutions, rather than blink-and-you’ll-miss-it marketing, she has built a brand that does just that: a brand that has earned pride of place in showers and bathroom cabinets around the world.
