Hayden Brass

It started at a market stall

Hayden grew up in Tasmania in a house that smelled like eucalyptus and tea tree. His parents ran a small natural products business: essential oils, hand-made soaps, candles, sold at markets around the state. He was raised behind that stall, and learned to count change before he could read.

Years later, travelling those same markets, the family kept being asked for an oil they had never heard of. It came from Kunzea ambigua, a native Australian plant with decades of Australian research behind it and almost nobody using it commercially. His mother Michelle, a naturopath, began using it with clients in her clinic. The results were good enough that the family started taking it seriously.

In 2016, at 24, Hayden co-founded Australian Kunzea Pty Ltd with Jade McKenzie and turned the family project into a business. His father Simon died that same year.

What Zea looks like now

Ten years on, Zea is four brands: Zea Relief for natural pain management, Zea Essentials for aromatherapy, Zea Gourmet for Australian native honeys and bush foods, and Zea Active for sports recovery.

The range sits in more than 3,000 retail locations across Australia, including Woolworths and 300-plus pharmacies, and sells on Amazon in Australia, the UK and Canada. Kunzea Pain Relief Cream is registered with the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods as a listed medicine, AUST L 360 331, and remains the world's first Kunzea-based product range.

Backed by the people who use it

In 2022 Zea ran an equity crowdfunding raise on Birchal and hit its minimum target in under an hour, closing at $940,000 from 643 investors. Most of them were customers first. That is a useful signal about the product, and it is also the model Hayden prefers: a business owned in part by the people it serves.

Profit and purpose

Zea became a Certified B Corporation in November 2021, and is the only pain relief brand in Australia with that certification. It is also a member of 1% for the Planet.

Hayden's argument is that certification is not a logo. It is an audit you re-sit, and it changes who you hire, which suppliers you use and what you decline to do. That is the subject he took to the TEDxCecilStreet stage in 2026, in a talk called "The Intersection of Profit and Purpose in Heart-Centred Business".

Most people have never heard of Kunzea. We're changing that.

The longer-term goal he has set publicly is to improve the quality of life of ten million people by 2030.

Beyond Zea

Hayden speaks and advises on what he has actually done rather than theory: building a product business from nothing, what B Corp certification really costs and returns, running a lean team with AI, and navigating Australian retail from small business to national distribution. He is a member of the Entrepreneurs' Organization, was a top-five PitchFest finalist at the Naturally Good Expo in 2018, and was named a finalist for Young Business Leader and Retail Business of the Year at the My Business Awards in 2019.

He writes and advises for other founders at haydenbrass.com.

Articles by Hayden

Hayden has written more than 100 articles for the Zea Journal and Health Library, mostly on Kunzea, the product range, and how Zea operates.