Hannah Porter
Co-Founder, Bear and Moo
Hannah Porter is a New Zealand entrepreneur and the founder of Bear & Moo, one of the country’s largest online retailers of reusable nappies and sustainable parenting products, based in Hamilton.
Porter’s background was in administration, event management, marketing and PR, mostly at the University of Waikato. She also worked as a marriage celebrant and wedding planner. The shift to entrepreneurship came from frustration: she hated how much money she was spending on disposable nappies for her eldest child each week and switched to cloth. But the options available at the time were either expensive or unappealing. She saw a gap for a middle ground, attractive, affordable reusable nappies that could make it easy for families to give cloth a go.
In June 2018, Porter whipped up a logo, bought a domain, set up a Shopify site and ordered 300 nappies from an overseas supplier. The brand name came from her two boys’ nicknames: Mister Moo and Hadley Bear. What started in a spare bedroom grew into a full-service e-commerce operation: Bear & Moo now retails thousands of products across three house brands, Bear & Moo, Hello Poppet and Launder & Love — spanning reusable nappies, swim nappies, reusable sanitary products, clothing, cot sheets, lunchboxes, toys and books. The business turned over million within four years and now operates from a warehouse in Hamilton with a team of nine-plus staff.
The recognition has followed. Porter won the 2020 Porter Group Micro-Business Award and the Air New Zealand People’s Choice Award. Bear & Moo has been voted Gold for Best Cloth Nappy Brand at the OhBaby! Awards in 2020, 2022 and 2024 and Porter was a finalist in the 2023 EY Entrepreneur of the Year awards.
Porter’s profile is noteworthy because she turned a spare-bedroom side project into one of New Zealand’s largest reusable nappy brands, growing Bear & Moo to seven-figure revenue while championing sustainable parenting as a practical, affordable choice rather than a premium one.
Hannah features in our look at the NZ women who redefined success on their own terms.
Sources: NZ Herald · EY New Zealand · Kiwi Families
About this profile
This profile was researched and written by Noteworthy using publicly available sources. If something here is out of date or incorrect, let us know and we’ll review it.
