After obtaining Diploma of Fine Arts Preliminary, Mike studied Law at Canterbury and Victoria Universities. He didn’t finish his Law degree but did break the World Rocking Chair record. He discovered advertising by accident, starting his career in Wellington.
Gained Diploma in Advertising, and in the process won the Trenchard-Smith Trophy for highest marks in Australia and New Zealand in the Advertising Institute Examinations, and the Reader’s Digest Scholarship for New Zealand’s Outstanding Young Advertising Man.
He co-founded advertising agencies; Colenso BBDO and Hutcheson Knowles Marinkovich and was formerly Managing Director of Saatchi and Saatchi. He has been a director of a number of public and private companies. Just recently he has founded Hutch&Co a new strategic marketing and communications consultancy.
He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing and has a Master of Philosophy degree (1st Class Hons) his thesis was on the alchemy of innovation in New Zealand business and was appointed an Adjunct Professor at Auckland University of Technology. Mike has written five books and written award-winning innovation and humour columns for the Independent Business Weekly and Idealog magazine. He has been a regular radio and television guest and commentator. He was inducted into the Marketing Hall of Fame in 2021
He was director of a family building company and in the late 70’s set up Replica Homes, with franchises throughout New Zealand. In 2003 he launched The Lighthouse Ideas Company. He also set up Scarborough Fair, a Fair Trade/organic coffee and tea marketing company and planted Lonely Cow vineyard on Waiheke Island.
He has held numerous Trustee positions; The Foundation for Youth Development and The Graeme Dingle Foundation (18 years), The Spirit of Adventure Trust, The Second Nature Trust (Vodafone Events Centre) and was on the Salvation Army Advisory Board in the mid 1980s. He is currently a Trustee of the Raye Blumenthal Freedman Trust and Chair of the Graeme Dingle Endowment Fund.
