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editorial Have you “moved your needle” recently? A LIGHT SO TOUGH THAT WE DROVE A TRUCK OVER IT! Watch the video at intex.co.nz/lumo NZ Hardware Journal is published 11 times per year (monthly except for January) Group editor Steve Bohling steveb@mpm.nz ddi 09 304 2705 Account manager Susan Kennedy susank@mpm.nz ddi 09 304 2706 Account manager Karen Condon karenc@mpm.nz ddi 09 304 2707 Studio manager Rachel Walker rachelw@mpm.nz ddi 09 304 2709 Event manager Nic McCord awards@mpm.nz mob 021 828 142 Publisher Simon Little simonl@mpm.nz ddi 09 304 2703 Subscription enquiries subs@mpm.nz Contributors to this issue Alan Johnston, Terry Herbert Printing Image Centre Phone 09 375 3097, Fax 09 309 0583 Lower Ground Level, 83 Mt Eden Road Grafton, Auckland 1023 PO Box 28372, Remuera, Auckland www.hardwarejournal.co.nz The opinions and materials published in New Zealand Hardware Journal are not those of the publisher except where specifically stated. The contents must not be published in any form without the permission of the publisher. © Copyright 2019 Marketplace Media VIRTUALLY INDESTRUCTIBLE I VERY MUCH enjoyed being able to take a morning out last month to attend some of GS1 New Zealand’s 40th Anniversary conference. Well organised (loved the ability to pose questions to keynote speakers through an app!), very well attended and with a juicy array of international speakers, I would have thought that GS1 Connect could, possibly should, become an annual event. Call me shallow, I’ll admit my initial motivation in attending was to hear (and possibly grab a scoop from!) Amazon Australia’s Country Manager, Rocco Braeuniger. Rocco however reminded us all that it’s Amazon policy not to pre-announce or talk about initiatives until they’ve happened... Oh well. Instead, as well as ticking off a plug for Amazon’s well-known customer-first outlook, he talked about not being afraid of failure which, oddly, was also one of the key themes of Amazon supremo Jeff Bezos’ annual Letter to Shareholders this year. Delivered in fact the very same day as the GS1 conference, although it comes off a little like one of those well- meaning TED talks, you might slim down Mr Bezos’ communication to just the following paragraph: “As a company grows, everything needs to scale, including the size of your failed experiments. If the size of your failures isn’t growing, you’re not going to be inventing at a size that can actually move the needle.” Have you been moving that needle recently? Also on GS1’s anniversary speaker list that morning were Prof Sanjay Sarma, live from MIT in Boston (who talked eloquently about what the Internet of Things really is), and Chris Quin, who runs the Foodstuffs North Island cooperative (who shared some insights into the reality, warts and all, of omni-channel in FMCG). HAVE YOU NEEDLED THE INDUSTRY LATELY? The Government has, even though it’s well intentioned (see page 6). It’s actually a little unsettling the sheer scale of what’s being proposed in the Government’s broad ranging parcel of construction industry reforms. Indeed, even MBIE pulls no punches when it says of what is being put to the building industry for consideration and comment: “These are the most significant reforms since the current Building Act was introduced in 2004. They will affect people, products and practices across the sector.” They’re not wrong there. It’s key therefore to have your say – download a copy of the discussion paper from www.mbie.govt.nz/building-reform and be sure to get your opinion in by 16 June 2019. Steve Bohling, editor steveb@mpm.nz 4 NZHJ | MAY 2019 MORE AT www.hardwarejournal.co.nz 2456 • 30/9/2018 www.abc.org.nz ISSN 1177-4223