September 18, 2025 • 7 mins
It’s the last days of Art in the Park this weekend – a uniquely curated art show held annually at Eden Park.
It showcases the works of both emerging and established New Zealand artists.
The King’s Trust has been the charity partner of the event for the last four years – an organisation formed in 1967 with the vision that every young person should have the chance to succeed.
It’s been running in New Zealand for six years, and CEO Rod Baxter told Kerre Woodham that in terms of economic value, they’ve quadrupled every dollar that was invested.
He says it’s not just about the success of the King's Trust and the Government, and the corporate supporters, but also the success of the community off young people.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Kerry Wood and Mornings podcast from
News Talks He'd be.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
I mentioned at the start of the show that I
went to Art in the Park last night. And it's
been a bit of a grim week. If you've been
with Talkback and with me all of this week, it
has been kind of bad news after bad news. And
it was hosing down and I thought art and Eden
Park and the rain and sculptures in the rain. But
my friend Dian and I said no, let's do it.
(00:32):
We said we'd go, We'll go, and I'm so glad
I did. It was utterly joyous, utterly joyous, and the
rain cleared, of course, so I could sit next to
one of mel Bishop's beautiful sculptures, a little puppy sitting
on a bench. It's joyous and wonderful and fun and
the art was just extraordinary. And it's on over the weekend,
(00:53):
so if you're in or around Auckland, I really recommend
you go. It's held annually at Eden Park and it's
just the most magnificent platform for New Zealand artists. They're
all there with their work so you can talk to
them about it, and there were so many young artists there.
And the reason I think Papes wise because Art in
the Park partners with the King's Trust charity. And Rod
(01:15):
Baxter is the CEO of the King's Trust and joins me. Now,
good morning to you.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Good morning, Kitty Kilder.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Tell me about the King's Trust and the amazing Hey
Cardinal scheme.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Sure things. So, the King's Trust was established in nineteen
seventy six by His Majesty actually during similar economic times
to what we're currently experiencing.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Now.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
We're young people. We're deeply concerned in the United Kingdom
about the economy course, and so his Majesty when he
was the Prince of Wales got out there, listened to
young people and created a bunch of programs based on
what they were asking for.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Oh and what sort of things did they ask for?
And how successful was it? I mean, we can all
ask for things, but you know, yes.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
Well, I think it's like one point two million young
people worldwide have been supported. The Trust has been here
on New Zealand for the last six years, and young
people were I think, deeply concerned about their futures. They
were worried how are they going to make a living
and what were they living for so fundamentally about purpose,
but about jobs and whatnot. And I think that the
(02:23):
young people that we meet are asking those questions. But
they're not just interested in being job takers. They're also
interested in being job makers. And so that's what we do.
We support young people to work out if self employment
is a good idea for them, and then if it is,
we give them small grants of money to set up
a business or to test an idea. And that's called
(02:44):
her Carcronal.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
So that was set up. I mean, the trust has
been around for a while, but here Carcinal was set
up in twenty twenty two and initially a two year
pilot So the fact that it's still going indicates it's
been successful.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
Yeah, it's been Actually it's exceeded my expectations for sure.
It's a partnership with government, with the Ministry of Youth
Development and a collection of corporate supporters such as Bailey's
and Forsyth Bar and then some generous philanthropists and so
we the pilot was a two million dollar fund that
we fund raised for and we supported one hundred and
(03:19):
twenty six young people to set up businesses and we've
just finished in an assessment of how successful those businesses were,
because we know that two thirds of businesses in New Zealand,
in the traditional startup space, two thirds don't survive two years.
We have a thirty seven percent survival rate. However, these
youth led businesses have a ninety three percent survival rate.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Wow, Like, are they sustaining themselves or are they just
side hustle businesses?
Speaker 3 (03:49):
No, Well, that's really interesting. So forty four percent of
these young people have left their day jobs and are
now working full time in their business. A third of
these businesses have created jobs. There's a few hundred jobs,
and twenty one percent are starting to export and go
and glow.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
No from that, I mean honestly, two million I know
sounds like a lot, but that's tiny for seed finance
for one hundred and twenty six young business that's right.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
Yeah. So the estimations that we've made in terms of
the economic value of this is that we've quadrupled every
dollar wow I was invested. And actually we're raving about
this because it's not just really the success of the
King's Trust and the government and the corporate supporters. It's
the success of this community of young people that haven't
just operated as competitive individuals and that kind of like
(04:40):
ruthless side hustle approach to business. They're supporting each other,
and they're right across the country as well, and they're
in such a wide range of industries. And you know,
there's a group in Totonger, for example, that meets every
Wednesday morning for coffee at a local cafe and they
help each other out with questions around tax or marketing
or whatever it might be. And I think that you know,
(05:00):
you talked about a grim week. I think where it was,
you know, rarely confronted about grim reality with GDP and
the economy. But I have so much hope that young
people and when we talk about young people talking under thirty,
that these youth lead businesses are really the future for
New Zealand's economy.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Well, we had an interview with the head of ice House,
you know, and heard about these young people who are
just the most extraordinary entrepreneurs and he said young people
can take risks. You know, they're aware of the grim
reality of the world, but they're not shackled by mortgages
and children and the boring realities, so they can be
(05:37):
bold and be innovative. But those are really good stats.
So I met a couple of artists that were exhibiting it.
Art in the Park have a number of them, I mean,
I see that they're all sorts of businesses, but have
some of them become full time artists as well as
that way they were there?
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Yeah, that's right, that's right. Yeah. So we support young people,
you know, with that fundamental premise of what are you
living for, what's your purpose and how do you want
to make a living? And I think for artists it's
particularly tough, isn't it right?
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Everybody wants to do that rather than stack supermarket shelves.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
That's right, And so we are really grateful for the
relationship with Adam the Park and Eden Park. It's such
a fantastic event and for the last four years the
King's Trust has been the charity partner. And what that
means that we run a devoted workshop for young artists
during the year and then the team behind Ardam the
(06:32):
Park mentor those young people and get them ready for
the show and we help them out with framing and
the exhibition and everything. So we've got I think fifteen
or sixteen young people out of the hundred artists that
are at Adam the Park. Three of them are on
the main floor. The featured artists this year is josh
Kiwikiwi and then upstairs, thanks to mans, we have a
(06:54):
emerging artist's gallery with a dozen up there. And I
heard that every single young person sold artworks last night
at the opening and they're ordering incredibly well.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
Well. The king Trust is doing amazingly well. Thank you
so much. I'm so glad we ended on a bit
of a positive note for the end of the week.
Speaker 1 (07:12):
For more from Kerry Wood and Mornings, listen live to
News Talks a B from nine am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
You're listening to the Kerry Wood and Mornings podcast from
News Talks He'd be.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
I mentioned at the start of the show that I
went to Art in the Park last night. And it's
been a bit of a grim week. If you've been
with Talkback and with me all of this week, it
has been kind of bad news after bad news. And
it was hosing down and I thought art and Eden
Park and the rain and sculptures in the rain. But
my friend Dian and I said no, let's do it.
(00:32):
We said we'd go, We'll go, and I'm so glad
I did. It was utterly joyous, utterly joyous, and the
rain cleared, of course, so I could sit next to
one of mel Bishop's beautiful sculptures, a little puppy sitting
on a bench. It's joyous and wonderful and fun and
the art was just extraordinary. And it's on over the weekend,
(00:53):
so if you're in or around Auckland, I really recommend
you go. It's held annually at Eden Park and it's
just the most magnificent platform for New Zealand artists. They're
all there with their work so you can talk to
them about it, and there were so many young artists there.
And the reason I think Papes wise because Art in
the Park partners with the King's Trust charity. And Rod
(01:15):
Baxter is the CEO of the King's Trust and joins me. Now,
good morning to you.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Good morning, Kitty Kilder.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Tell me about the King's Trust and the amazing Hey
Cardinal scheme.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Sure things. So, the King's Trust was established in nineteen
seventy six by His Majesty actually during similar economic times
to what we're currently experiencing.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Now.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
We're young people. We're deeply concerned in the United Kingdom
about the economy course, and so his Majesty when he
was the Prince of Wales got out there, listened to
young people and created a bunch of programs based on
what they were asking for.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Oh and what sort of things did they ask for?
And how successful was it? I mean, we can all
ask for things, but you know, yes.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
Well, I think it's like one point two million young
people worldwide have been supported. The Trust has been here
on New Zealand for the last six years, and young
people were I think, deeply concerned about their futures. They
were worried how are they going to make a living
and what were they living for so fundamentally about purpose,
but about jobs and whatnot. And I think that the
(02:23):
young people that we meet are asking those questions. But
they're not just interested in being job takers. They're also
interested in being job makers. And so that's what we do.
We support young people to work out if self employment
is a good idea for them, and then if it is,
we give them small grants of money to set up
a business or to test an idea. And that's called
(02:44):
her Carcronal.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
So that was set up. I mean, the trust has
been around for a while, but here Carcinal was set
up in twenty twenty two and initially a two year
pilot So the fact that it's still going indicates it's
been successful.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
Yeah, it's been Actually it's exceeded my expectations for sure.
It's a partnership with government, with the Ministry of Youth
Development and a collection of corporate supporters such as Bailey's
and Forsyth Bar and then some generous philanthropists and so
we the pilot was a two million dollar fund that
we fund raised for and we supported one hundred and
(03:19):
twenty six young people to set up businesses and we've
just finished in an assessment of how successful those businesses were,
because we know that two thirds of businesses in New Zealand,
in the traditional startup space, two thirds don't survive two years.
We have a thirty seven percent survival rate. However, these
youth led businesses have a ninety three percent survival rate.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Wow, Like, are they sustaining themselves or are they just
side hustle businesses?
Speaker 3 (03:49):
No, Well, that's really interesting. So forty four percent of
these young people have left their day jobs and are
now working full time in their business. A third of
these businesses have created jobs. There's a few hundred jobs,
and twenty one percent are starting to export and go
and glow.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
No from that, I mean honestly, two million I know
sounds like a lot, but that's tiny for seed finance
for one hundred and twenty six young business that's right.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
Yeah. So the estimations that we've made in terms of
the economic value of this is that we've quadrupled every
dollar wow I was invested. And actually we're raving about
this because it's not just really the success of the
King's Trust and the government and the corporate supporters. It's
the success of this community of young people that haven't
just operated as competitive individuals and that kind of like
(04:40):
ruthless side hustle approach to business. They're supporting each other,
and they're right across the country as well, and they're
in such a wide range of industries. And you know,
there's a group in Totonger, for example, that meets every
Wednesday morning for coffee at a local cafe and they
help each other out with questions around tax or marketing
or whatever it might be. And I think that you know,
(05:00):
you talked about a grim week. I think where it was,
you know, rarely confronted about grim reality with GDP and
the economy. But I have so much hope that young
people and when we talk about young people talking under thirty,
that these youth lead businesses are really the future for
New Zealand's economy.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Well, we had an interview with the head of ice House,
you know, and heard about these young people who are
just the most extraordinary entrepreneurs and he said young people
can take risks. You know, they're aware of the grim
reality of the world, but they're not shackled by mortgages
and children and the boring realities, so they can be
(05:37):
bold and be innovative. But those are really good stats.
So I met a couple of artists that were exhibiting it.
Art in the Park have a number of them, I mean,
I see that they're all sorts of businesses, but have
some of them become full time artists as well as
that way they were there?
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Yeah, that's right, that's right. Yeah. So we support young people,
you know, with that fundamental premise of what are you
living for, what's your purpose and how do you want
to make a living? And I think for artists it's
particularly tough, isn't it right?
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Everybody wants to do that rather than stack supermarket shelves.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
That's right, And so we are really grateful for the
relationship with Adam the Park and Eden Park. It's such
a fantastic event and for the last four years the
King's Trust has been the charity partner. And what that
means that we run a devoted workshop for young artists
during the year and then the team behind Ardam the
(06:32):
Park mentor those young people and get them ready for
the show and we help them out with framing and
the exhibition and everything. So we've got I think fifteen
or sixteen young people out of the hundred artists that
are at Adam the Park. Three of them are on
the main floor. The featured artists this year is josh
Kiwikiwi and then upstairs, thanks to mans, we have a
(06:54):
emerging artist's gallery with a dozen up there. And I
heard that every single young person sold artworks last night
at the opening and they're ordering incredibly well.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
Well. The king Trust is doing amazingly well. Thank you
so much. I'm so glad we ended on a bit
of a positive note for the end of the week.
Speaker 1 (07:12):
For more from Kerry Wood and Mornings, listen live to
News Talks a B from nine am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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