Sarah Kennedy: Calocurb CEO launches Kiwi alternative to Ozempic

The weight-loss industry is on track to bring in billions by 2030 - and one Kiwi company is taking advantage of the craze.

Calocurb was developed with the help of Plant and Food Research and it's selling itself as a natural appetite suppressant.

CEO Sarah Kennedy the company is growing every quarter - and has attracted significant interest in the US.

"The biggest thing for us in the US is not only word of mouth, it's advertising. One company spent a billion dollars, but we're not going to do that - we don't have to." 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Loss industry is on track to become one hundred and
fifty billion dollar industry just in the next six years
or so. And a kiwweight loss company is riding on
the coattails of the Azemba craze with a huge increase
in sales in the US. It's Callo Curb. Callo Cub
was developed with the help of plant and food. It's
a pill that reduces hunger and cravings in women particularly.
Sarah Kennedy is the founder and the chief executive of
Callow Kurban with us. Now, Hey, Sarah, hi, he hi.

(00:23):
I'm well thinking about you guys pre date ozempic how
much so you will you will be able to look
at the effect that Ozempic's had on your business. How
massive has it been?

Speaker 2 (00:33):
Oh, it's been extraordinary. And I'll tell you why ozempic is.
Let's be a little Can I be science geeky for
a minute.

Speaker 1 (00:41):
I'll go for it.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Ozembic is actually a Ozemplic is actually a brand name
for synthetic hormone GLP, one that you inject in yourself
which tells the brain you're full. It just mimics a
hormone that we have. So that's a brand name. In
twenty twenty one, Nova Noorders had their drug with GOV,

(01:04):
which is a sister to ozempic approved for approved for obesity,
so as zempic is for diabetes, what GOV is now
now In twenty twenty one twenty two, they spent a
billion dollars on advertising in the US, so they educated
the market on what GLP one did. Do you know

(01:27):
they also took out two hundred and sixty thousand doctors
for dinner and lunch. I don't think I'm getting anywhere
near that, but you know, we're going to try.

Speaker 1 (01:38):
But this GLP one is this is this not basically
what your product also releases?

Speaker 2 (01:45):
Yeah, so really interesting. They inject in a synthetic, so
you inject yourself in we stimulate your own natural release.
Now a lot of things will say that, like a
berberine or something like that will say that, but we
stimulate at six hundred percent above baseline. You have to
be above four hundred just to make a behavioral change.

(02:08):
So we're six hundred. We did that. We know within
an hour we reduce calorie and tape by eighteen percent.
And I think what the last clinical we just published
a month ago in obesity pillars in the US. We
did it in women and we showed that we reduced

(02:28):
hunger by thirty percent, cravings by forty percent, and rebound
eating by fourteen and a half. I mean, this is
huge to get those behavioral changes. And this was developed
here in New Zealand by plant and food research.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
Why does it have a greater effect on women than men?

Speaker 2 (02:46):
Oh, that's really interesting. Well, hypothesis is that women have
a greater sensitivity to GLP one, so this natural hormone
to tell you to stop eating to protect their fetuses.
So it's basically, yeah, it is. So that was that's
a hypothesis for it. So women and we also do

(03:07):
joke a little bit when when you know, when we're
do doing these clinical studies, we do believe women foreign
instructions more than men as well.

Speaker 1 (03:17):
I've done a clinical study in my marriage and I
can tell you that's true.

Speaker 2 (03:20):
Yeah. No.

Speaker 1 (03:20):
Now, now, you at one stage said that you believe
that you have here in your hands a one billion
dollar unicorn company. When are you going to hit the
one billion mark?

Speaker 2 (03:31):
Well, you know, just we are growing at four to
six hundred percent per quarter. This will be the twenty
fifth conference that we've been to in fifteen months, we
go again. We're literally going every month to these large conferences. Sorry,
I'm taking a long way round. Do you know the
main thing that people say to us we go to
practitioner conferences, why haven't we heard of you before? Why

(03:55):
haven't we heard of you? So the biggest thing for
us in the US is not only word of mouth,
it's advertising. Noverboord spent a billion dollars that we're not
going to do that, and we don't have to do
that because we are the only natural and let me
say that, and we are the only natural one in
the world. And we're actually just being patented in December

(04:16):
last year in the US.

Speaker 1 (04:18):
That's stuff. Now, given that Plants and Food was, you know,
the part of the development of this, does the government
have a stake in it?

Speaker 2 (04:26):
Yes? Absolutely, we pay back a royalty to them. Well,
I'd have to let Plant and Food say that. But
I'm delighted by the royalty. And I'm not just being
altruistic here. You know, I've been in New Zealand And
in the science arena for many years and I'm absolutely
delighted that we're paying back a part of all of
our net sales to plant and food research. You know,

(04:47):
and I think this is important to realize in science
in New Zealand that early research is what would call
blue skies. There was nothing commercial or no commercial company
behind it, and that we can actually pay that money
back into So I'd like the government to keep thinking
about that blue skies research because that's where we came from.

Speaker 1 (05:08):
Oh, Sarah, how fascinating. Hey, thank you and best of
luck with everything. I hope it goes really well and
you make us an extremely wealthy country. Sarah Kennedy, founder
and chief executive of callokup. How good would that be
if they were or the natural ozempica we become the
you know what, who is it over in? Is it
Finland or Denmarke? It's Denmark, isn't it? As making all
the money of Ozmpic is like literally a portion of

(05:30):
their GDP. Now imagine if that was asked. How good
care we Bank has cut its mortgage rates again, so
the mortgage battle is still raging. Their one year rate,
which is now six point two nine percent, is the
best in the market. They've cut their shortened their long
term rates somewhere between four and twenty basis points unfortunately
did cut the deposit rates as well, but there you go.
It's on quarter two. For more from Heather Duplessy Allen Drive.

(05:54):
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