Mānuka Charitable Trust Scores Own Goal in Trademark Attack on Comvita Mānuka Honey Cosmetics

Mānuka Charitable Trust (MCT) has upended a four-year Comvita marketing effort in the US by opposing “THE MĀNUKA EFFECT” trademark application. A suite of Comvita mānuka honey cosmetics is sold under that pending trademark. A joint venture between Comvita and Hollywood A-lister-linked Caravan Digital sponsored the creation of the cosmetics. MCT failed to see the New Zealand connection. Bruce Roscoe reports.

By Bruce Roscoe

Cartoon created by ChatGPT.

This was a mountain mānuka honey always wanted to climb – a mountain piercing rarefied air and inhabited by luminaries in the worlds of entertainment and sports who would reserve a place for it in their life kit, and sing its praises from the summit. A cosmetics product wasn’t a jar of honey but good vibes from one could migrate to the other.

Comvita attempted such an ascent in December 2021 when it partnered with Vancouver, B.C.-headquartered Caravan Digital L.P. to launch the joint venture Caravan Honey Company. Today this venture lies in ruins but the suite of Comvita mānuka honey cosmetics it launched is as alive as the trademark opposition Mānuka Charitable Trust filed on 5 January with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

MCT failed to see the New Zealand connection in the Caravan Honey Company application for “THE MĀUKA EFFECT” trademark under which a suite of five cosmetics said to contain Comvita “medical grade” mānuka honey was launched in October 2025 under the Aunu brand. Comvita contributed NZD5.9m in capital and expenses to the development of the cosmetics and the digital platform on which they are sold.

Caravan Digital links to Creative Arts Agency (CAA) in Los Angeles. Julia Roberts, Meryl Streep, Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, Eric Clapton, Son Heung-Min, former President Barack Obama and first-lady Michelle Obama (for their books) are among luminaries, past or present, who populate the roster of CAA. Newer age celebrities, from the worlds of Hip-Hop and YouTube, for example, are no less represented. The agency is one of the Hollywood control trinity– the other two are William Morris Endeavor and United Talent Agency.

Caravan Digital’s website claims a “partnership with CAA” and the ability to offer “proprietary access to the CAA ecosystem”.

“Not Related to New Zealand”

MCT states in file number 99115801, now lodged before the USPTO Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, that it had “searched for a web presence” for Caravan Honey Company to no avail. The applicant was “not a New Zealand entity”, MCT concluded.

MCT further searched the website of UMF Honey Association (UMFHA) for “caravan” and “caravan honey” but results showed “no certified brands bearing that name”.

“Therefore”, MCT stated, “on information and belief, Caravan Honey Company’s intended use of the trademark was “not related to New Zealand nor the Māori people”.

The Aunu range includes five mānuka honey cosmetic products, with honey supplied to the American company by Comvita and marketed using THE MANUKA EFFECT™, a trademark being opposed by The Mānuka Charitable Trust.

To pile-drive the point, MCT, noting that Caravan Honey was addressed to 1560 Broadway, Suite 810, New York, wrote: “Consumers generally know the Māori people do not originate from New York”.

MCT concluded it would be “damaged” if “New York-based owners” obtained “rights to use a Taonga and a part of mātauranga Māori despite not being associated with the Māori people nor…sourcing honey from New Zealand…”

Variations are minor in MCT’s opposition filings, which resemble a one-size-fits-all template. Responding to the “Force Factor Royal Manuka Honey” trademark application filed in March 2025 by Force Factor Brands LLC, a dietary supplements company located in Boston, MCT wrote: “Consumers generally know the Māori people do not originate from Massachusetts”.

Old News

Comvita announced its intention to form the Caravan venture to NZX on 6 September 2021. Radio New Zealand (“Comvita partners with celebrity brand promoter Caravan”) and the New Zealand Herald (“Comvita hitches Caravan for celebrity brand promotion in North America”) reported the news the same day. Online trade press, such as just-food.com, also ran the story.

The venture, Caravan Honey Company L.P., was owned 50:50 by Caravan Digital L.P. and Comvita and registered in the state of Delaware on 8 December 2021. Caravan Digital also is registered in Delaware, a tax-haven state.  

AI references “Comvita”, “mānuka honey”, and “Caravan” in the first sentence of a succinct summary (search tip: “caravan” + “mānuka honey”), while helpfully distinguishing the venture from Caravan COFFEE STAND that once sold mānuka honey in the Japanese port city of Yokohama. The Comvita announcement to NZX appears at or near the top of search results.

Searching the internet for “The Mānuka Effect” pending trademark itself shows the Aunu Beauty website and Aunu Instagram videos of expert and influencer testimonials also in the top five results. In one video, Dr Adam Geyer, who introduces himself as Aunu's chief of dermatology, notes Aunu’s “exclusive access to Comvita’s Medihoney.^TM”

UMFHA, a hybrid of industry association and private members’ club, does not fully disclose members, licensees, or licensees’ brands. Rather, the UMFHA website in search results shows the brands that licensees have allowed to be displayed. One licensee, for example, may operate as many as six UMF brands – in some cases more product label than brand – but select only one or two of those for display. It is not possible for consumers – or trademark attorneys – to confirm that the mānuka honey they encounter is “certified” by UMFHA.

Several companies are addressed to 1560 Broadway, Suite 810, which appears to serve as shared office space or business center in New York. MCT, an essentially North Island entity that addresses to 15 Show Place, Addington, Christchurch, will understand addresses of convenience or compromise.

Financial statement junkies can find 25 references to the Caravan venture in documents publicly disclosed by Comvita in 2021-2024.

Victoria & Jennifer

“Victoria Beckham Beauty Veteran Launches Aunu, a Skin Care Brand Celebrating Mānuka Honey” headlined a 22 October 2025 report by Emily Burns in Beautyinc. “Jennifer Krouse has partnered with New Zealand-based producer Comvita to bring medical-grade Mānuka topicals to the market”, the article began.

Victoria Beckham, wife of soccer icon Sir David Beckham, achieved global stardom as Posh Spice in the 1990s’ pop phenomenon the Spice Girls. She later launched fashion and beauty product labels. Jennifer Krouse served as Lady Beckham’s chief operating and financial officer at Victoria Beckham Beauty in New York for four years before devoting herself to Aunu in March 2024.

Between that Aunu foundation date and the Aunu website launch seven months later, Comvita’s relationship with Caravan Digital had disintegrated. But a direct parallel relationship appears intact between Ms Krouse and Comvita for the bulk supply of mānuka honey as an ingredient for manufacture of the cosmetics within the US.

Aunu website and social media content presentation evince a large investment and finely tuned advertisement for both the finished products and raw material. There is nothing home-baked about any section of the site.

Mānuka is written with a macron throughout and occurs, mostly in the same breath as Medihoney^TM, about 30 times throughout the site’s 17 product pages and science, ingredients, and source (that is, New Zealand) sections. All is amplified by active social media platforms (Facebook and Instagram; Tik Tok videos to come). A media page introduces product launch coverage in 23 high-wattage cosmetics publications. A LinkedIn account is active.

Leaping Bunny is on top of things. Certification by this bunny attests to cruelty-free products. Bunny’s brand page says, “Aunu is a prestige skincare brand that utilizes the key ingredient of Mānuka honey. Our Mānuka honey is sourced directly from Comvita...” The Aunu website acknowledges that the mānuka tree is a “treasured Māori species”.

Self-Sabotage

MCT’s intellectual property role has been funded by a war chest of about NZD6.7m or NZD8.2m when committed funds are added (Table 1). UMFHA, the Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment, and the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI), are the principal source of these funds. Also, under an MPI co-investment requirement, three mānuka honey producers, which include Comvita, contribute funds directly to MCT.

Comvita records starting equity and expense payments of NZD5.9m for Caravan Honey Company. That increases to NZD7.1m If equity-accounted losses of NZD1.3m from two reporting periods are added. Comvita, as the largest funder of UMFHA through its levy payments, in a circular way has funded the opposition to trademark protection for products that contain and champion its own honey.  

MCT in December 2024 also opposed a US trademark application filed by Streamland Honey Group, which is a UMFHA member and licensee located in Rotorua. Streamland Honey surrendered. Should neither MCT nor Caravan Honey capitulate, both may become engaged in 16 stages of litigation through August 2027, according to a case schedule published by USPTO.

Caravans & Connections

Comvita in its 6 September 2021 announcement to NZX described Caravan as a “Joint Venture with entertainment and sports agency, Creative Artists Agency (CFA)”. This is incomplete. Companies A and B invest equally in new company C, which becomes the “joint venture”. Comvita names neither the venture it is forming nor the name of one partner in the “Joint Venture” of its announcement.

A connection between Caravan Digital and CAA is explained in the Hollywood Reporter article “Seeking to Expand Your Celebrity Brand? CAA-Backed Caravan Can Help With That” (7 March 2024) but neither Caravan Digital nor CAA has responded to requests for confirmation of the maintenance of this link. According to US cosmetics trade press, CAA leavers were among the founders of Creative Labs L.P. (which was renamed Caravan Digital in March 2021). Caravan Digital’s stated “partnership” with CAA appears as a description of an informal cooperative relationship that grew out of shared personal history.

Comvita had begun a “strategic partnership” with Caravan, central to which was the “formation of a celebrity-backed lifestyle brand” for mānuka and propolis, according to the 2021 announcement. No brand name was announced then or later. Comvita puffed: “Our partnership…will amplify the awareness and benefits (of mānuka honey and propolis) through the eyes of celebrities who turn to Comvita for solutions”.

The announcement teased: “…exact details of timing and products are commercially sensitive, but we look forward to sharing more details in due course." No details were shared. But it soon became clear that whatever Comvita thought it had bought, Caravan Digital wasn’t selling.

No celebrities would emerge to sprinkle stardust over Comvita or turn to the company “for solutions”. Celebrities, particularly those in the upper echelons through to A-lister, do not sully their standing by plugging products.

In Caravan Digital’s world, the customer is the celebrity or links to a celebrity. The celebrity name value is converted into revenue through the sale of own-brand products. Caravan Digital promotes and grows the brands through forming business partnerships, directing the creation of websites and other digital content, and advertising.

Aunu receives top billing in the portfolio section of Caravan Digital’s website. The linkage to Lady Beckham is indirect but “Victoria Beckham Beauty” and “Posh Spice” are powerful associations nonetheless.

Comvita and mānuka beauty products may be star-crossed. The Caravan misfire is the second time around for Comvita to invest in a five-product skincare suite to the promises of the world but the world doesn’t show up. Or if it does, it’s on someone else’s doorstep. Comvita launched the huni ® skincare range in New Zealand, Australia, Hong Kong and UK in October 2007. Within four years, the project was halted in silence.

Screenshot from www.hellocaravan.com

Vanishing Point

A photo of a palm tree-lined avenue is used as the banner image on both the Caravan Digital website and Facebook page. It is a segment of Sunset Boulevard, the storied thoroughfare stretching from downtown Los Angeles to the Pacific Coast Highway via Hollywood, Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, and Beverly Hills through to Pacific Palisades. It is a dream-weaving nursery of celebrity culture. Terrain in some stretches is high enough to see either side of the boulevard converge into a near vanishing point. Caravan Digital’s website records no Los Angeles office address.

The metaphorical point at which Comvita shareholder funds vanished was situated about a one-hour flight away to the north east where Comvita appeared to have mistaken Los Angeles for Los Vegas. Comvita had played a zero-sum game where, as in poker, no value is created when an amount of money changes hands between loser and winner. (Comvita impaired its Caravan Honey Company investment to nil in accounts to June 2024. Table 2).

Not all may be lost. Creative minds may see a movie in this account of left and right hands seemingly uncaring of what activity engages the other hand against a backdrop of lust for stardust. Genre selection – action, comedy, farce, horror, suspense, or unrequited love – could be problematic. Maybe a genre-bending blend would attract a studio looking for that illusive something that has everything. Just don’t expect CAA from 2000 Avenue of the Stars in the city of angels to volunteer any A-listers or even extras anytime soon.

THE END

Bruce Roscoe is a Japan-resident researcher and former foreign correspondent and securities analyst.

References: This report has been sourced from Comvita Ltd financial statements, annual reports, and announcements to NZX; UMF Honey Association financial statements; records of the Ministry for Primary Industries and Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment; trademark application and opposition filings made with the US Patent and Trademark Office; records of the Division of Corporations of the US State of Delaware; and the websites of Caravan Digital and Aunu Beauty. Note: Some data values may not add due to rounding.