Christchurch entrepreneur Nicole Gaviria gets $100,000 for business helping women with eating disorders

RNZ News

18-07-2025

Nicole Gaviria is on a mission to help women end binge and emotional eating. File picture.
Photo:
A Christchurch entrepreneur whose business idea was once backed by the King's charity for start-ups has now landed another major supporter and cash boost.
Nicole Gaviria has been selected from 16,000 business owners around the world to be mentored by Dragon's Den investor and host of the Diary of a CEO podcast, Steven Bartlett.
It is one of the world's most popular business podcasts, reporting 50 million monthly listeners.
Gaviria is a counsellor who started up Binge Free Bestie on a mission to help women end binge and emotional eating.
As part of the win she will also get $100,000.
Gaviria told
Checkpoint
she was still in absolute shock after finding out about her success.
"It's been an incredible, incredible week and I'm so excited to just see where this can go."
She said the journey to get to this point had not been easy, having to let go of her first business Lulah Co, a plus-size activewear brand.
"I think my journey is probably pretty similar to a lot of entrepreneurs in Aotearoa. I've built my business from the heart, I've lead with passion, but it's not been easy."
Gaviria started Lulah Co with the Prince's Trust seed grant, an opportunity for people under 30 who are curious about starting a business.
"I was actually living in my friend's garage at the time, I was under 30, I was curious about business and it just popped up during lockdown as an advert."
From there she began the size inclusive activewear brand, with the goal of empowering women.
"I wanted woman to have a safe space to explore their relationship with their body and the activewear was one way I kind of tested the waters, but what I really wanted to do was support women with eating disorders and specifically binge eating.
"It was an amazing time but you know fashion in New Zealand is a pretty hard business to crack."
After the end of Lulah Co and while working as a councillor, binge eating remained an issue Gaviria wanted to help people through, sparking the idea of Binge Free Bestie.
"My passion for this field for eating disorders comes from my own lived experience. So I had a binge eating disorder throughout my 20s," she said.
"I didn't even know that's what it was. I thought I was just like, you know, every other woman who struggles with food and eating and always struggling to be a certain shape and size."
She said despite binge eating disorders being the most common of eating disorders, there were very few options when it came to treatment and support in New Zealand.
"The options that we have for eating disorder treatment are a very small amount of services out there, let alone things that are publicly funded."
With her business, Gaviria hopes to help tackle part of the issue.
"What I'm really trying to do is create a space for these women to come to be part of a community, to feel safe to share and get some real therapeutic tools."
She said her work as a councillor had helped her develop tools to help other women who were suffering from binge eating disorders.
"I have the resources and I have the backing from someone who knows what they're doing in business to actually take these ideas that I have, so I've already developed a group coaching programme that guides women."
"Basically I'm giving them a road map to end binge eating for good and to get out of diet culture and really find food freedom."
But with the help of Bartlett, she said she hoped to take the business even further.
"[With] that funding, I can take it global. I can make massive impact and I'm just so excited at the possibilities.
"I'm really curious what he might suggest, but the idea is to grow this global community."
Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero
,
a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.