Photography: Eva Bradley.
Taine Randell has spent much of his life leading from the front. He’s captained the All Blacks, built a globally successful business and made big decisions at countless boardroom tables.
“I’ve had a really lucky life,” he says humbly.
But when he announced he was standing for New Zealand First in this year’s election, in his home electorate of Tukituki, there was one group of people he couldn’t get on side – his family.
“My wife wasn’t happy,” laughs Taine. “She’s still not. My daughter was furious too. As parents, we think we’re in charge, but really, it’s her.”
Inspiration for change
However, behind the family banter lies a serious reason for the decision. At 51, Taine insists he wasn’t looking for a new career. After a successful couple of decades in business and their kids almost fully grown, he could easily spend more time on the golf course. Instead, he explains, he’s chosen politics for a very personal reason.
Taine and his wife Joanne Edwards’ eldest son, 22, has recently started a graduate finance role in Auckland, while their 20-year-old son is at university and their youngest attends the same Hawke’s Bay school her mum once did.
Watching them take their first steps into adulthood has sharpened his thinking about New Zealand’s future, but it was a conversation with his eldest that stopped Taine in his tracks. Here was a young man who’d earned top marks and secured an excellent job, yet when they started talking about housing, the numbers didn’t add up.
“He could have a great career and still struggle to buy a home until he’s 35,” says Taine. “That’s crazy. My grandparents built a life here in Hawke’s Bay and my parents did too. If you worked hard, got an education, got a job or started a business, you could get ahead. I want that for my kids too.”
It’s that belief that ultimately led him to stand for New Zealand First. The party’s focus on regional development and promise to tackle the cost of living resonates strongly with the businessman in him.
He talks passionately about creating opportunities outside the main centres, as well as increasing competition in the supermarket sector and addressing energy costs.
“Rugby was never really the plan”
While Taine will be remembered by most Kiwis as an athlete, he insists, “Rugby was never really the plan.”
While studying law and commerce at the University of Otago, he was preparing for a conventional career when rugby suddenly turned professional.
“It almost happened by accident,” insists Taine, adding that he spent only 10 years or so playing pro rugby. “A lot of people will always see me as just the former All Black captain, but business has been the bigger part of my life.”
After retiring from the All Blacks at 28, he and Joanne moved to London, where he combined rugby commitments with a career in oil, emissions trading and financial exchange. “It was an incredible time.”
But after yet another rain-soaked British winter with two young kids, Taine handed in his resignation in 2008 and the family moved back to Aotearoa, where he, Joanne and her dad built Freeze Dried Foods NZ into a Southern Hemisphere giant, exporting to North America, Asia and beyond, before being sold to a multinational company in 2023.
Finding balance
Today, the wha¯nau lives on the rural fringe of Havelock North. Looking back, Taine says building the business was every bit as demanding as elite sport.
One morning shortly after the company was sold, he realised he’d slept through the night for the first time in decades.
“I hadn’t woken up worrying about wages, staff, customers or power bills,” he says. “It made me realise how much stress I’d been carrying.”
These days, life is a little quieter, although there’s still rugby. On the day of our photoshoot, Taine was coaching a local club that was short on players and donned a uniform just in case he was needed on the field. And last week, he led a team of former rugby stars to victory in a charity match against some sporty politicians in Russell.
“But the body isn’t quite what it was in my twenties!”
Asked why he’s opening himself up to public scrutiny when he could easily spend the next chapter of his life enjoying himself, Taine says, “It’s either now or never.” And if politics doesn’t work out? He grins, “I’ll come back and work on my golf, which is pretty average.”
