New Zealand Refrigerating Company

A committee was formed in Dunedin early in 1881 but it was not until New Zealand Shipping Company's steamer S S Mataura arrived over twelve months later that New Zealand Refrigerating Company directors: John Roberts, Edwin Spence and Alexander Begg took responsibility for overseeing the loading of freshly killed stock owned by runholders for freezing on board ship.

As well as the 3,844 sheep, 6 bullocks and 77 sucking pigs the Mataura carried: hares, rabbits, fowls, ducks, barracudas, hapuka, pūkeko, frost fish, cheeses, hams and a cask of penguin skins.

Defective tins, over-supply and a period when station-owners were unwilling to take the risk of having their own livestock canned led to the company's liquidation and the acquisition of the plant by the Bank of New Zealand.

The new company with its directors and shareholders almost entirely from Belfast Northern Ireland bought the farmers' livestock taking the risk of getting a good price in London.

The trade became established but unregulated shipments created shortages and gluts on the British market and farmers who shipped on their own account found it difficult to check on the activities of possibly unscrupulous buyers.