Our people are the heart of everything we do, from our customers,
store teams and support office to our supplier and manufacturing teams, people are the key to our success, and we take that very seriously.
20 years ago we implemented a culture based on six guiding values that inform everything we do.
We live and breathe our values on a daily basis, and they are celebrated regularly. How we treat our customers, our colleagues, and our suppliers is a measure of who we are and inspires us to thrive and achieve great things together.
Creating diverse, high-functioning teams is a big part of our purpose, “together we create to inspire”. Our business operates a DDO (Deliberately development organization) where teams are challenged to give and receive feedback and to take all opportunities to grow in their roles, grow resilience, and develop their life skills.
Culture of Family.
We are a family business in name and nature, set up 34 years ago, our CEO Shane Anselmi had a vision to create a strong New Zealand Footwear brand with an inspired team to run the business.
With footwear in his veins, Shane undertook the evolution of the existing small family chain of footwear stores and started the Overland journey.
Over the years we have developed our Purpose “Together we create to inspire" a common goal to guide our daily work lives. Whether in a Digital, Marketing, Operations, Finance, Retail, or Product team, we aim to create outputs on a daily basis that inspire those around us.
We value our team and in turn their families and recognise there is life beyond work. We have implemented two days a week Work From Home for our Support office team and also offer flexi Fridays ( one paid half day once a month), to enable our teams to flex their work around their families and lifestyle and recognize the importance of work-life balance.
We also offer free access to EAP “Employee Assistance Program” to our employees and their families for counselling on a broad range of life and work issues.
The last few years have created unique pressures for our people, and we strive to offer support, empathy, and solutions, to better enable our people to enjoy their daily lives.
Diversity
Our teams are made up of a diverse and talented group of people. Our goal is to employ, train and inspire the best person for the role…. Every time. This applies to all areas of our business from our Retail teams to our Support Office and our Distribution centre.
We also operate an active Health and Safety committee which includes representatives from Retail, our Distribution Centre and Support Office, to proactively promote a safe, respectful, diverse, and inclusive workplace.
Deliberately Developmental Organisation
We operate a DDO organization, which means we are committed to fostering the personal and professional growth of our employees while operating a culture of feedback and transparency.
Our Support Office team has a quarterly ‘’In the Making’’ session to keep the team informed of the progress of projects, the financials of the business and update teams on strategy and direction.
Our Support Office teams set seasonal OKR’s (Organizational Key Results), that form a part of their seasonal performance reviews. Teams are bonused on a combination of their performance and the company results.
Our retail teams have a Leadership Conference either virtually or in person at our Support Office, at least 3 times a year. We take the opportunity to lead learning workshops, gain product feedback insights, and provide personal development training, all of which foster engagement, enthusiasm, and friendships among our teams. Our retail teams are bonused on a number of different sales criteria, enabling great performance to be rewarded
Fostering talent across the business is a key aim of our organisation. All team members have the opportunity to apply for roles across the business. We operate a “flat” structure that encourages the team to bring forward ideas directly to our Senior leadership team and to put their hands up to learn more about any aspect of the organisation they are interested in.
We have many team members work their way from retail up to Support Office roles as we value the knowledge and insights they bring from being at the customer facing side of the business.
China Team
We operate our own manufacturing resource in Houjie China employing approximately 150 management and workers. This is a registered WOFE (Wholly Owned Foreign Enterprise). All workers at our MCD factory are paid a living wage according to China's employment legislation.
Our China team have implemented their own values set that is similar to ours in New Zealand but which recognizes some key cultural differences. We take whatever opportunities we can to integrate the two teams and include our MCD team on celebrations and recognition.
Guiding principles for MDC factory:
- Working conditions: Working conditions are safe and hygienic and meet all local and national standards.
- Respectful working environment: All employees must be treated with dignity and respect and at no time will discrimination be used in the recruitment process.
- No Child Labour: Child labour is not used in MCD factory or any suppliers used by the factory. All employees must meet minimum the local minimum legal working age.
- Fair Working Hours: Working hours and employee benefits must at least meet local or national regulations. Any overtime will be compensated at an agreed rate and overtime will only be worked on a mutually agreed basis.
- Bribery and Corruption: MCD will not tolerate the practice of bribery or corruption in dealings with suppliers, customers or any associated parties.
- Reduce Environmental Impact: MCD will work to reduce their environmental impact on an incremental basis. They will strive to improve materials and processes, to reduce their carbon footprint in collaboration with Overland Footwear Group. All local or national environment laws must be adhered to.
- We have committed to paying our team members in China above the living wage for our region Shenzhen.
The Young Hearts Project
Giving back is important to us and important to our teams. Making a positive difference to people’s lives enables us to feel connected to a bigger purpose.
In 2012 we established “The Young Hearts Project “our charity supported by a $2 donation from every full-priced pair of Deuce sneakers sold.
“The Young Hearts Project “supports the following charities whose focusses are on mental health and wellbeing for New Zealand’s youth.
How We Help
Since 1995, The Graeme Dingle Foundation has been helping young New Zealanders find purpose and direction through their highly effective programmes for young people aged 5 to 18 years old.
We support one of their programmes Kiwi Can through an interactive values and life skills programme delivered to primary and intermediate school students. Delivered by specially trained teachers, the programmes promote values of; positive relationships, integrity, resilience and respect.
How We Help
The Young Hearts Project formed this partnership on a shared passion and commitment to helping young people and the issues they face today. We have been proudly supporting Youthline since 2014. Youthline was created over 50 years ago and has 10 centres across New Zealand. It was established to ensure young people know where to get help and can access support when they need it.
We also help fund regional youth development programmes and information services including referral services, early intervention, counselling and health promotion
Volunteering – there are often opportunities that come up for us to provide a hand. Most recently we helped shake buckets in our community to fundraise for Youthline's annual Winter appeal.
How We Help
For nearly 30 years the Great Potentials Foundation has been working with low-income New Zealand communities, helping to unleash the potential of children, young people and families through education and parental support. Great Potentials helps over 5,000 children, young people and families across New Zealand each year.
Great Potentials run a fantastic mentoring programme in schools and communities across Auckland and the Waikato. We specifically support their MATES Junior programme to help support intermediate students making the transition to secondary school by providing academic support, teaching life skills, building meaningful relationships and embracing the joy of learning to enable fundamental change
How We Help
Headspace is the Australian National Youth Mental Health Foundation providing early intervention mental health services to 12-25-year-olds. Each year, Headspace helps thousands of young people access vital support through their Headspace services in over 150 communities across Australia, online and phone counseling services, vocational services, and presence in schools.
Headspace can help young people with mental health, physical health (including sexual health) alcohol and other drug services, and work and study support. For locations of Headspace services, as well as factsheets and resources for young people and their families and friends, please visit the Headspace website.
World Vision
In addition to the Young Hearts Project, every single one of our Merchant 1948 store sponsors a child and their families in the village of Onga, Malawi; we’re proud to be a household name there thanks to World Vision.
Until recently Onga was faced with many challenges: malaria, droughts, hunger and disease. Thanks to World Vision, and through our sponsorship, Onga has received 2491 mosquito nets, 155 dairy cows, 10 toilets (and 2 especially for girls) in schools, 25 playground sets, 2950kg of maize and soya bean seeds, and 66 boreholes have been drilled or rehabilitated.
Thanks to initiatives like these, their village is now beginning to thrive; The overall health and education of the community has improved.
Our stores regularly exchange handwritten letters with their sponsored children and their families, and we’ve even had a visit from the Chief of Onga himself! He spent time at our office and stores, and shared his story with us. To say he was inspiring is an understatement. We couldn’t be more proud to be involved in realising change for the village of Onga.
Donations
Extending the lifecycle of our shoes and upcycling where we can is an increasing focus for us.
We have a recycling bin in our Westfield Newmarket store, where customers can return lightly worn shoes for us to recycle to charity. We plan to roll out more up-cycling initiatives over the coming season.
As a fashion business we also often have samples that are lightly worn, or shoes that are returned for minor reasons. We donate many of these to charity including Dress for Success and Fix Up Look Sharp.
