The Kiwi Company Changing How The World Listens On The Run

Earshots, a young company out of Palmerston North, have re-invented headphone technology by including a magnet that secures the wireless ear bud to your ear. They're expanding to markets all over the globe, have won product design awards and we caught up with founder James Bell-Booth to hear about the incredible journey so far for this homegrown tech start up.

Where did the original idea for Earshots come from?

The original spark came when I was training for the T42 trail run in 2014. I remember climbing using a traditional-style headphone. The first 20 minutes were fine, but then you begin to move less smoothly and you get a bit sweaty and I found myself asking, “Are my headphones going to fall out?” You just don’t want that niggling feeling that gear is about to fall out when you’re running or riding for long distances or doing something technical.

I don’t know where the idea for magnets came from. It just popped into my head!

Starting any business is tough, but talk to us about the challenges of designing, manufacturing and launching something brand new.

I did what most people do and I talked to my wife saying, "Can we re-mortgage the house and pay a product designer to build a prototype?" I thought we’d get it right straight away, but it was an absolute failure. Then we didn’t have any money left. So I thought maybe I should put the idea to bed.

But I was still running and riding, and I said, "You know what, the best founders solve the problems themselves." So, I went out and taught myself to mould using epoxies and plastics. For the very first prototype, I got an iPod Shuffle and epoxied it to a random hook thing and attached some magnets to it. From that starting point there was two and a half years of kitchen table modelling and trialling.

I was fortunate to have a co-founder who was a software engineer and also knew about hardware and together we went from handcrafted models to 3D printed models.

It took three and half years to get the magnet system to work. And then an additional 18 to 24 months to move from just having the magnet system to actually having a product that has audio in it. That involved finding a factory and going to China four times.

We had our first 100 units production-ready in October 2019. So that was five years to journey from the spark to the product. We sold those first 100 and from that we had enough confidence for me to go full time in March 2020 ... and then we had a thing called Covid-19!

Wow, what a time to launch a new business?! How did that unfold?

We had a baby coming in April of that year and I’m sitting in the baby room at a dinky little desk trying in earnest to get this business going. I wouldn’t say it was stressful, but it was scary. If I had to write a book it would be something like “Sticking to the plan, when nothing goes to plan”! That’s been the story of getting this off the ground.

But in a weird way Covid turned out to be quite good for us because of the “buy local” activity of the time. We actually beat our forecast numbers every month. So it gave us a lot of confidence.

For many New Zealand start ups, hardware and manufacturing overseas can seem like a bridge or two too far, how have you found working with manufacturers in China? And any recommendations for other Kiwi businesses looking to follow in your footsteps?

Our Chinese team have been amazing. It’s a big place and there are a lot of lovely people. EarShots wouldn’t be around if it wasn’t for the people at the factory we work with and how much they’ve supported us, doing things without expecting payment, going above and beyond.

My number one piece of advice is to find people who have done it before, because the way they do business up there is very, very different to how we do it here. You need to be guided through it. Secondly, if you want to build a really good relationship, one with integrity and where your IP is looked after, you have to go over there in-person. Relationship, trust and family is much more important than it is here where you’ll do business just based on a contract.

In 2020, Earshots won Gold in the Consumer category at the Best Awards, how much did this mean to you and the team?

That was probably the most special. Product design is the core of what I’ve been doing in this company. So it’s nice to be acknowledged for the work that we’ve done by people in that field—that we've done something unique and done something well. That was a really proud moment.

It's been quite the journey from re-mortgaging your house, to working in your baby room through a pandemic and now to have a growing and successful business, what have been some of the key take-homes for getting to where you are now?

It’s like any goal, for example in sports, you've got to get the right people around you and do the right training. I draw quite a lot of inspiration from sport and think about business in the same way. You’ve got to commit to the journey, train as hard as you can and get great people around you to guide you.

And as far as Earshots is concerned, the key has been to understand our particular customers, who are active, outdoors and do extreme things. And we need to search out for those little things we can do to delight that particular customer.

For more about Earshots, check out their website here.