Te Puke Connector Timeline — Public Transparency Statement

Public transparency statement · Vector Group Charitable Trust (CC45966) · Last updated June 2026

To the Te Puke and Western Bay community, funders, council, and anyone researching our digital lineage:

We publish this account so there is a single, source-backed record of Te Puke's online community connector work — from tepukedirectory.co.nz (January 2017) through tepuke.travel to kiwifruit.capital and tepuke.online today. It is not a phone book story. It is infrastructure: directory, youth pathways, employer networks, and what happened when we documented that model to council, collaborated in the district, and sought partnership funding.

Sources: founder email archives, Internet Archive (Wayback) captures, Western Bay District Council LTP submissions, grant application records, and public news where cited. Selected Wayback captures below. We welcome factual corrections.

One-line summary

Vector Group Charitable Trust built Te Puke's first online community connector (live 27 January 2017), documented the model to Western Bay District Council (LTP 2018–28), collaborated with Mark Boyle and the Te Puke Economic Development Group, with Dale Williams (Otorohanga mayor) and his Mayors Taskforce for Jobs / Otorohanga youth-employment model in this region, plus youth-employment networks and employers, and was not funded at scale by council, TECT, BayTrust or Acorn for that delivery — while continuing the connector line through tepuke.travel, a deliberate platform direction shift, and today's kiwifruit.capital + tepuke.online gateway.

What we mean by “connector”

From day one the project was wider than business listings:

• Directory scope — local business, events, jobs, classifieds, property, and Western Bay of Plenty coverage (searchable map of Te Puke and the wider district).
• Youth → jobs — linking mentoring and job placement with listed employers; informed by Dale Williams’ Mayors Taskforce for Jobs and the Otorohanga mayor's youth-employment model that Te Puke partners (including Mark Boyle / EDG) were adapting for Western Bay; training pathways including driver licensing, forklift, barista, trades, web development, and film/media skills.
• Physical + digital — the same trust ran youth work (The Loft / Youth Creatives, TPHS support, TEPUKEMAG, Te Puke Film, CACTUS) alongside the directory.
• Council record — the LTP submission cites tepukedirectory.co.nz alongside vectorgroup.org.nz and community film work; youth centre operational from March 2017 (72 Jellicoe St; RSA hub from November 2017). LTP Full Submissions Pack — Part 9 · VGCT statement of intent (Dec 2016)

Master timeline

tepukedirectory.co.nz (2017) — what we built

Platform: Brilliant Directories (Geo Search theme) with claim-listing workflow.

Main navigation (circa 2017): Home · Members · Events · Content · Products · Jobs · Property · Western BOP.

Search scope: Local business, events, classifieds, jobs, pages, blogs, not-for-profits — hero flow: Search → Review → Connect.

Branding:tepukedirectory wordmark with “Kiwifruit Capital of the World” under the logo (visible on Oct 2017 Wayback) — the same positioning that later became kiwifruit.capital.

Scale: Internet Archive shows 135 results on the profession-directory search by 6 April 2017 — about ten weeks after our 27 January go-live (founder emails fill the gap before first Wayback capture).

tepuke.travel — successor brand on the same connector line

tepuke.travel carried the directory forward as a travel + local business hybrid — the Te Puke and Districts Collaborative Directory reorganised for visitors and tourism (Visit, Stay, Eat, regional sections) while keeping employment and get-listed flows.

• Nov 2018 Wayback — Te Puke Travel Directory on the Brilliant Directories stack.
• Jun 2018 Acorn application described: “Tourism focus and local directory project (www.tepuke.travel)” — formerly Te Puke and Districts Collaborative Directory; cited 148,365+ projected annual site hits from five-month analytics.
• Apr 2019 rebuild — founder outreach to local businesses (e.g. The Daily Cafe listing page) while rebuilding the site.
• Dec 2019 Wayback — Te Puke Kiwifruit Capital of the World regional portal with Visit, Stay, Eat, Drink, Go, Inspire, By Region sections and a listings grid.

Domain registration date for tepuke.travel is not recoverable from WHOIS; earliest public evidence is 31 August 2018 (49 Wayback captures through May 2024).

COVID-19 (2020) — community advice and open business lists

When COVID-19 reached New Zealand in 2020, Vector Group Charitable Trust turned the same connector infrastructure toward urgent community information — public-health guidance and which local businesses were still operating under lockdown and alert levels.

• Dedicated Te Puke COVID-19 website — VGCT published community advice and local COVID-19 guidance on a standalone Te Puke site (separate from the travel/directory front ends, focused on resident safety and council-aligned messaging).
• Open business directory on VGCT — maintained open-business listings on vectorgroup.org.nz and the connector line so people could see which services and retailers were open as rules changed.
• Collaboration with Te Puke EDG — worked with Mark Boyle and the Te Puke Economic Development Group on TPEDG’s COVID-era business list, aligning VGCT open-directory data with EDG’s list so the town had one coherent picture of operating businesses.

That was the same 2017 connector idea in a crisis: collate and publish what the community needed — businesses, advice, and pathways — when Te Puke could not wait on slow official channels alone.

VGCT platform migration — our line only

Same connector vision, four platform steps on our domains (EPIC is separate — see below):

1. tepukedirectory.co.nz — Brilliant Directories (2017 go-live).
2. tepuke.travel — Brilliant Directories (travel + directory brand; Wayback from Aug 2018).
3. WordPress — deliberate move off Brilliant Directories; tepuke.travel continued on WordPress (same brand, new stack).
4. kiwifruit.capital — WordPress Bay-wide regional directory (successor to the travel/directory line).

tepuke.online is the Te Puke category gateway into kiwifruit.capital — a separate front door, not the full regional directory.

Two directions — VGCT connector vs EPIC Te Puke

EPIC Te Puke Events and Promotions Group Inc is a separate operator with a different platform history. EPIC was never on Brilliant Directories. Their path (founder-corrected):

1. WordPress — epictepuke.co.nz events / promotions site.
2. WordPress + local street directory — downtown listings embedded on the same EPIC WordPress site (first directory Wayback 5 Apr 2017, ~50 listings).
3. Kept EPIC WordPress and built Te Puke Online separately on Flaxx.io (tepukeonline.nz) — parallel brand, not a replacement of epictepuke.
4. Recently announced migration of the Te Puke Online directory to WordPress on tepukeonline.co.nz — in progress at time of writing.

Additional local history supplied to VGCT credits Rebecca Larsen with developing the early EPIC Te Puke members-directory vision. That early EPIC directory is understood to have been primarily a members-focused directory, rather than a fully open whole-town directory. The later wider Te Puke Online directory appears to have followed a different model under Flaxx, drawing on the broader town-directory approach being used elsewhere.

Further governance context has also been supplied about the most recent Te Puke Online change. A person connected with EPIC is described as having come onto the board or into the project environment before the Flaxx-based directory was discontinued and the new WordPress live site proceeded with that person's husband as the web developer. Supplied public domain records for tepukeonline.co.nz do not visibly show EPIC Te Puke as the registrant in the same way a member or funder might expect for a community directory. We record this carefully as a governance and continuity question: who owns or beneficially controls the live domain, who holds admin access, and what written handover protections exist for EPIC, its members, and the wider community?

Why our platform path diverged from EPIC

VGCT: Brilliant Directories (tepukedirectory.co.nz, then tepuke.travel) → WordPress (tepuke.travel, then kiwifruit.capital). Directory theme evaluation from 2022 (MyListing, ListingPro comparison); Bay-wide production on kiwifruit.capital in 2025.

EPIC: WordPress-first on epictepuke.co.nz, parallel Flaxx.io Te Puke Online, recently announced WordPress migration for that online directory — never Brilliant Directories, not our stack.

Council “duplicate of Epic” claim

Founder records from 17 February 2018 note WBOPDC declined a matching-fund application citing duplication with an “Epic members directory”. We dispute that framing: our site was live from January 2017, documented at wider scope on council's LTP file, and pursued youth-employment infrastructure EPIC's downtown street directory did not deliver. We record the reason given; we do not accept it as an accurate characterisation of prior art or scope.

Collaboration — who we worked with (2017–2018)

This was a collaborative field, not a trust working alone. The connector sat in the same youth-employment wave as Dale Williams’s work as mayor of Otorohanga — the Mayors Taskforce for Jobs and the Otorohanga model of collating business, youth, and job data so young people could move into local work. Te Puke was learning that approach through Mark Boyle and the Te Puke Economic Development Group at the same time we built the directory.

• Mark Boyle — Te Puke Economic Development Group; EDG meeting 31 Jan 2017 (same day as the Dale Williams outreach); Graeme Walker (EDG) later forwarded MTFJ invites.
• Dale Williams — mayor of Otorohanga; national Mayors Taskforce for Jobs lead; founder emailed him directly after the EDG meeting seeking the Otorohanga-style collation software and contacts to adapt for Te Puke / Western Bay; MTFJ presentations and invites shared with Giles Day through 2017.
• Giles Day — YEP Youth Employment Project; employer survey; nztaskforce.co.nz hub (*“Zero waste of young people”*).
• Grant Dally — council liaison (named in Apr 2017 Loft / strategic plan email).
• Employers — Eastpack, Zespri sponsorship outreach (Jan 2018).
• Community partners — The Loft, The Daily, churches, BOP Film, Social Link, Salesforce donation, Westpac Te Puke — documented in Apr 2017 strategic plan and Jun 2018 Acorn application.

“Collaboration, cooperation and coordination with other service providers will be prioritised to encourage strategic and sustainable community development.” — Acorn application, 22 Jun 2018

“We have been engaged with strategic collaboration since 2015 with key stakeholders in the Te Puke district.” — same application

Funding — sought in good faith, not delivered at scale

Public wording we stand behind: we documented the connector to council, collaborated widely, and sought TECT, BayTrust, Acorn, council matching funds, and employer sponsorship in good faith. Founder records from 2018 onward show no scaled local funder support for VGCT connector infrastructure. We kept building on our own path.

What we operate today

• kiwifruit.capital — Bay of Plenty regional platform: work/harvest, live/stay, industry knowledge, 3,200+ geocoded listings, heritage editorial. Same “Kiwifruit Capital of the World” lineage as 2017.
• tepuke.online — Te Puke category gateway; front door into the regional directory.
• kairesilience.food — national kai / food-resilience directory under the same trust umbrella.

The connector vision — businesses, jobs, events, youth pathways, regional scope — continues across these properties. EPIC's epictepuke.co.nz (WordPress) and tepukeonline.* (Flaxx → announced WordPress migration) remain separate operator properties.

Domain lineage (do not confuse)

Where to read more

• Short summary (Kiwifruit.Capital):Te Puke Directory origins
• Te Puke gateway summary:tepuke.online/history
• Bay of Plenty directory:kiwifruit.capital/listings
• Harvest & work hub:kiwifruit.capital/harvest-work-bay-of-plenty
• Trust home:vectorgroup.org.nz

Right of reply

If any organisation named here wishes to correct the factual record, contact [email protected]. We will update this page when provided with verifiable sources.

Vector Group Charitable Trust · CC45966 · Envisioning Sustainable Communities Creatively · Te Puke, Bay of Plenty