Jade, Hayden and Zea: Building Something Bigger than Profit
Hayden Brass grew up watching his parents work together and, for a long time, took one clear lesson from the experience: he would never work with his partner.
He had seen the long hours, the financial pressure and the way business and family life could become completely intertwined. His parents worked hard, often simply trying to keep money coming in, and he knew what that pressure could do to a relationship.
Then he met Jade McKenzie.
By then, Hayden had taken a family project and turned it into a business. The project had begun when his parents, who sold soaps, oils and other products at markets around Australia, noticed customers repeatedly asking about the oil of a little-known Australian native called Kunzea ambigua. Hayden's father, a horticulturalist, began investigating it, working with a compounding pharmacist to develop creams and explore its properties. Hayden, who had studied marketing and business, saw the potential to build something much bigger around the ingredient.
Today, Zea produces topical medicinal products for muscle aches and pains, mild arthritis, nerve pain and other conditions. (In fact, I’ve recently started using it, and it’s great.)
Jade came into the picture via a networking event. She was running her own events agency. They got to know each other, began dating in 2019 and eventually started testing what it might be like to work together, with Jade initially joining the business as a contractor. Then in 2020, COVID arrived and Jade chose to wind up her events agency and join the business full time.
Jade was initially quite determined not to get involved in Hayden’s business. When they first started dating, her attitude was essentially: "It's nice that you have a product business, but that doesn't mean I'm going to like the product."
Then she tried it. Her response was: "Oh ****, this stuff is really good!"
Profit, but with a purpose
For Jade and Hayden money isn't the organising principle of either their business or their relationship.
That doesn't mean it doesn't matter, however, both talk about money as something that enables the life and impact they want to create, rather than the reason for creating the business in the first place.
For them, business is about "profit for purpose": growing enough to increase their impact and make a difference to people’s lives, rather than simply making as much money as possible.
That purpose shows up in what they call their "green tape".
Where red tape is bureaucracy imposed on a business, green tape is the set of constraints they willingly impose on themselves because of the kind of business they want to be.
They became a B Corp and a member of 1% for the Planet. They have steadily increased the recycled content in their packaging and introduced tin and glass options. Their Kunzea is wild harvested. These things create extra work and, at times, extra cost, but that is precisely the point: purpose isn't meaningful if it only survives when it is convenient.
It also gives them a shared answer to the question, why are we doing this?
Same destination, different approaches
Purpose might unite Jade and Hayden, but their personalities are far from identical.
Jade describes herself as "progress over perfection", while Hayden is the "detail and perfection" counterpart. She brings energy, communication, relationships and a strong instinct for how the business shows up externally. Hayden is, in Jade's words, more of the internal engine.
Those differences are an advantage but also where the tension lives.
Jade might see a new sales channel or marketing opportunity and want to move immediately. Hayden will want to slow things down, check the margins and understand the detail. More than half the time, Jade says, his initial opinion might be completely different from hers.
Their task isn't to eliminate that tension. It's to make good use of it. They know they're trying to reach the same outcome from different directions and, most of the time, work their way towards a middle ground.
However, there is another complication that comes from being partners rather than ordinary colleagues: you don't always bother with the professional veneer.
Jade admits she's likely to be more direct with Hayden than she would be with someone else. If she believes something is wrong for the brand, she'll say so. The trust between them creates room for candour, but it doesn't automatically make the delivery easy to receive.
Hayden also describes a period of around 12 months when business was difficult, money was difficult and they found themselves "against each other", pushing rather than supporting.
Eventually they realised they couldn't keep operating as opponents. They had to get back onto the same team. That reset didn't mean they suddenly stopped disagreeing. It meant they became more deliberate about prioritising one another within the disagreement. Now, they talk openly, share a clear vision for both their business and family, and continually return to the fact that they want the same thing, even when they disagree about how to achieve it.
The relationship underneath the business
For all their differences, mutual admiration emanates from both of them.
Hayden talks about Jade's communication, passion and ability to keep moving through difficult things. Jade, in turn, speaks about the depth of Hayden's knowledge, and the heart and soul he has put into carrying the family legacy forward.
This leads neatly to Jade's advice for other couples working together: be each other's cheerleader.
She acknowledges that two ambitious people with strong opinions can easily find themselves competing to be right. But, as she puts it, she wants Hayden "to be as successful and reach his full potential as much as possible."
They also advise couples with employees to be upfront about the dynamic that comes with a couple-led business. Jade and Hayden can be unusually candid with one another, so team members need to understand that direct disagreement isn't necessarily personal or a sign that something is wrong.
It seems that this is a thread running through their whole story.
They don’t need to agree all the time. What matters more is their shared sense of purpose and a commitment to remembering that they are on the same team, no matter what.
Interview and article by Siân Jones