Ep 7: The Wins, The Losses - 34 Years of Building Annah Stretton

At 14, Camille Keyte went to visit her boyfriend and was kidnapped in a meth lab. It was the beginning of a life that would move through trauma, bodybuilding, sexual compulsion, methamphetamine, gang connections, motherhood, business ownership and serious criminal offending. From the outside, Camille appeared capable and successful. She owned a hairdressing salon, had a home and was raising two daughters. Behind that life, addiction was changing shape. Her obsession with bodybuilding became so extreme that she invited men over for sex to meet the number of calories she believed she had to burn each day. Methamphetamine later took control, and Camille eventually became a dealer within the gang environment. Within eight months, she lost her salon, her home and her children. By November 2020, Camille was wanted by police. She wore a wig into Kmart to buy clothes for prison, drove the length of the North Island believing every car behind her was an undercover police officer, and eventually handed herself in. What followed was a high risk cell at Auckland Women’s Prison, a song on the radio, a mother prepared to call the police on her own daughter and a decision that changed Camille’s life. Today, Camille has turned her lived experience into leadership in addiction recovery. This is not a comfortable story. It is a powerful account of trauma, cross addiction, offending, motherhood and the extraordinary work required to build an entirely different life. This episode discusses addiction, violence, kidnapping, sexual assault, suicide and compulsive sexual behaviour. For free and confidential support, call or text 1737 at any time. For alcohol or drug support, call the Alcohol Drug Helpline on 0800 787 797.

Peta Mathias has never been very interested in standing still. At 76, she is still travelling between New Zealand and France, leading culinary adventures, running Supper Clubs, writing books and finding new reasons to say yes. From washing dishes in a Paris kitchen to owning a restaurant, becoming one of New Zealand’s best-known television food personalities and now releasing her 20th book, Peta has built a life around food, colour, curiosity and a considerable amount of courage. She joins me from her home in Uzès, in the South of France to talk about the risks that worked, the ones that didn’t, Dolly Parton, rejection, reinvention and why she has absolutely no intention of disappearing quietly into retirement. Recipes from the Supper Club: A Ritual of Togetherness is out in October. Connect with us on socials 🎧 Stretton Unfiltered Instagram 🎧 Stretton Unfiltered Facebook 🌸 Annah Stretton TikTok 🌸 Annah Stretton Instagram 🌸 Annah Stretton Facebook 🌸 Join our VIP page 🌸 www.annahstretton.co.nz

New Zealand fashion is under pressure. But is the problem fast fashion, cash strapped consumers and offshore competition, or has parts of the industry simply stopped giving people what they want?In this episode, Annah and Sami get into the uncomfortable realities of fashion today: why we keep buying incredibly cheap clothing even when we know how it may have been produced, the extraordinary rise of secondhand, Shein and AliExpress copying designer product, and what the closure of Sylvester says about longevity and relevance in business. They also challenge the idea that New Zealand consumers or government should be responsible for keeping local fashion brands alive simply because they are local. After 35 years in fashion, Annah has seen the customer change dramatically. Some weeks, as much as 80% of her own company's sales can now come from accessories rather than clothing. So perhaps the bigger question isn't whether New Zealand fashion is broken. It's whether fashion businesses are changing fast enough to remain relevant.

Sam Stubbs grew up knowing exactly what it felt like not to have money. Today, the company he founded manages billions. But Simplicity was built differently. It is a nonprofit, gives millions back into New Zealand communities and is investing heavily in housing, while Sam has some fascinating ideas about what business, wealth and success should actually be for. Annah talks with Sam about poverty, money, ambition, ageing, family, the inability to completely switch off, and why he believes New Zealanders could eventually have enough invested to fund our own future. This is much more than a conversation about KiwiSaver. It's about what happens when success stops being measured simply by how much you keep.

Annah went to Norway and Scotland with one question: what happens when prison becomes more than simply somewhere we detain women? RAW independently funded the research, taking Annah inside Skien Women’s Prison in Norway and HMP Stirling in Scotland, two women’s prisons taking thought-leading approaches to detention. What she found was opportunity embedded into the day. Work. Education. Skills. Relationships. Responsibility. Normality. Time being used rather than simply served. Back in New Zealand, those observations became a 33,000-word discussion paper examining what could translate to Aotearoa and how it connects with 12 years of RAW experience. In this episode Annah is joined by her sister Rebecca Maxwell, RAW’s Clinical Operations Manager, to bring that conversation back to the Rangiora Women’s Unit at Waikeria, where RAW is already challenging what a day in prison could look like through Haea te Ata. This isn’t about making prison easy. It’s about asking what we want imprisonment to achieve. Because she’s coming out anyway. What opportunities will she have had before she walks out the gate?