When Copy Cats Come Calling—a story of small business copyright infringement

We've all heard stories of small businesses being directly copied and having intellectual property stolen by big businesses—Temu immediately comes to mind as an international behemoth who rides roughshod over independent creatives and reproduces work that isn't legally theirs's but will sell it like is anyway. The act is often so brazen that it defies belief, but at the same time its also kind of removed because...how do you bring an entity like Temu to heel?

This is like that, but it's not a faceless international reseller doing the taking, it's a local lady from Inglewood. 

If you've ever been burgled, you'll know just how violating it is

The overview of how I stood up for the business I built from scratch

• It has been months of costly legal letters back and forth.
• The copying was Initially denied.
• After being presented with multiple examples, I have it in writing that Michelle Byrne, owner of Your Home Naturally admits to copying from my business.
• I thought that the road to her admitting to this infringement would be the hard bit.
• However, I can now say I was wrong, because following this was lengthy delays, ignoring deadlines, broken promises and offers that have left me speechless—for all the wrong reasons.
• My final conclusion is as a small business owner trying to protect my business from Intellectual property theft... It's exhausting—for my own sanity, I'm ready to close this dark chapter and move on.
• So here is my cautionary tale about copycats.

How I first found out my hard work wasn't just on my website

Figgy & Co grew from my idea, Figgy & Co is my third baby

It wasn't just words for instructions that I found, there was also Figgy's recipes that were basically a copy and paste along with instructions for use and problems solving tips.

I'm sure you are as shocked as I was. Can you can see why this felt like a total violation? It just seemed SO UNBELIEVABLE that I thought... there MUST be a good reason for this. 

Now before we go any further I want to say that the New Zealand wellness community serves a great number of Kiwis who value their health. And because of this, there are plenty of places to buy natural cleaning supplies. There are other small businesses offering their take on tox-free cleaning, & while there is some overlap as you could expect, we each have our own original materials with recognisable 'fingerprints' and have each been able to establish our own way of offering services & products unique to our businesses. There has always been enough room for us all to do that. Prior to this, in 10 years of me offering my take on tox-free cleaning through Figgy & Co, I have never before had a situation like this were I felt that what was my original work, was being ripped off. 

 

What I did after finding my words were being used by another business

After collecting evidence of published Figgy & Co materials being copied and passed off as her own, I sent Michelle a cease & desist letter. Initially via her lawyer she outright denied any copying.

 

So I showed her one example of verbatim copying—to feel her out.

 

With one piece of clear evidence staring her in the face, she admitted to taking my words from my website. But her response, again via her lawyer, attempted to play it down, saying "it was just one time". 

 

But I had receipts in the form of lots and LOTS of examples of Figgy & Co published materials appearing on Michelle's website. It was easy to pick the text that was an exact word for word copy, but I also used plagiarism software and was able to quantify the similarity of hybrid text, some of it with 72+% matching words and sentences. None of it being credited to Figgy & Co, all being passed off as her original work. This time via her lawyer, Michelle admitted to uplifting & taking all of it.

 

I know, you're thinking this is totally out the gate. Like HOW COULD SOMEONE DO THIS???? Another small business owner choosing to take a carbon copy. Could it have been a foolish mistake... NOPE! 

It actually gets worse. 

Website tracking revealed every keystroke and exposed an attempted cover up

 

Check out this bombshell—which in my opinion shows Michelle knew EXACTLY that she was breaking copyright laws and trying her best to get away with it.

 

Website tracking data doesn't lie! During my deep dive I found some very disturbing information. Turns out while I was busy minding my own business, Michelle had been slipping in & cherry picking Figgy content for years!

In 2022 while setting up & 'creating' Your Home Naturally she purchased the Figgy & Co recipe booklet. This gave her access to the Figgy & Co DIY cleaning recipes and supplementary materials that came with it. I have very clear evidence that shows she tried her to cover her tracks to hide her identity. I think we all know why that was.  

She has been goring on Figgy & Co content for years

Turns out I had been serving Michelle a Figgy treat every few weeks. See, after buying from a company, it is normal for the customer to be added to your Newsletter database. This means from the time she purchased the Figgy & Co recipe booklet in 2022 she was receiving the emails I sent out to customers—about new products, and cleaning tips, promotions & sales, everything. 

In that 2 years until I sent her a cease and desist letter, I have data records that show she had access to a grand total of 63 newsletters and went onto my website a minimum of 67 occasions using both her person email and other times with her work email. When I drilled down into all of those website visits—I could actually see each page she visited, every cleaning guide and every product listing read. It turns out Michelle had been all over my website—in fact my website tracking data produced a report that was CLOSE TO 280 PAGES LONG detailing all the access Michelle had to the Figgy & Co website and Figgy's original content.

Not long after records show Michelle purchasing the Figgy & Co DIY cleaning  recipe booklet, the Your Home Naturally recipe book was published...and you guessed it, it's full of examples of word for word Figgy & Co recipes and instructions & also lots of paraphrased hybrid text & single sentences with just a word or two changed or reordered.

I also found recipes and text that I recognised from other NZ businesses who make and sell natural cleaning products. 

 

So I bet you are dying to know what happened after all of this...after the big call out.

Well pretty much everything I called Michelle out on as counts of copyright infringement, she said she would remove and change. That she would rewrite her wording to be within the scope of her original work and knowledge.

Now, officially Figgy & Co recognised and published wording has been removed from the Your Home Naturally website, recipe book, social media and workshop lessons. In regards to social media and in-person teaching workshops, that was impossible to track. I actually can't see the Your Home Naturally Instagram or Facebook.... Michelle blocked me 🫠

 

But like a kick in the guts, what was promised in my opinion wasn't what was delivered. I highly suspect that Figgy & Co original words, sentences and paragraphs were simply reworded via Chat-GPT. AI has a vibe that can be easy to pick—what was presented as Michelle's rework sounded less Figgy in tone and word choice, but of course the bones of the knowledge based were the same. 

 

I have since learnt that this 'reworking' I was picking up on is a Copyright infringement term called spring boarding—This is when instead of creating original content by starting with a blank screen and your own words, you use a competitors information as the base and you simply rework it so is no longer seen as a direct copy. So yeah, I told you it was a kick in the guts.

Can we agree to untangle our businesses?

 

Now at the beginning of this blog I told you that I was initially hopeful of reaching an acceptable resolution.

 

Indeed, Michelle said she would re-write her recipe book, stop teaching my materials at her workshops & would remove the text from her website that I could show was published original Figgy & Co content. 

 

But...after those early wording 'changes' were made, that put some distance between our businesses, reaching a final and complete resolution all fell over. Then came delays, missed deadlines and customer communication that I would not accept.

 

The sticking point came down to the recipe book that she had sold as her own that contained Figgy & Co published content in it. I wanted that file deleted by all the people who had purchased it, and for Michelle supply them with her actual own recipe book, with her original content. 

I asked for a cover letter to be included that explained the reason for the new file and the reason why there was a request to delete the old file. I expected this to be HONEST so that the person receiving the new file understood why the old one needed to be deleted. 

 

2 cover letter variations were written by Michelle. Neither were acceptable from my persecpective, and while I don't have room to share them here this is the gist of them.

 

1. That the new file was simply 'new and improved' and the 'licence' for the old one was out of date and so, should be deleted. 

 

2. That Michelle was simply inspired by Figgy & Co and that was why there was Figgy & Co content in Your Home Naturally recipe booklet

 

Needless to say, these did not sit well with me - honesty and transparency is the pillar of Figgy & Co—these cover letters were out right rejected.

 

The matter of the cover letter became an impasse. Resolving this matter dragged on and on with delays and missed deadlines—By late in 2025 I wanted this nightmare to be over. I had arrived at the belief that finding an acceptable agreement was likely near zero and I didn't want to bring this into 2026.

I instructed my lawyer to reach out one last time, I gave Michelle a final chance to put this right or I would walk away. 

 

Michelle initially replied via her lawyer that she was committed to working out an agreement, but she needed MORE TIME, then she ignored the deadline to resolve this matter before the end of 2025.

 

So I chose to disengage from discussions with Michelle Byrne. I walked away because it was dragging on & on and taking its toll. And while my lawyer said I had a strong case to take to court, seeking recompense via this avenue was cost prohibitive. 

I want to point out at this stage that I was really surprised this is were it ended up. I genuinely believed that after that initial letter with evidence of copying, Michelle would apologise and put the matter right. You might have thought the same too?

 

The long and the short of it is I was just so sick of going round and round in circles—with Michelle doing just enough rearranging of words so you couldn't pin point where they originally came from—but no honesty in owning her errors and no compensation for years of Figgy & Co materials being passed off as her own to generate income. 

 

Does calling out copy cat behaviour have a happy ending?

 

So now you are up to date with my experience as a small New Zealand business owner and copyright infringement. This has been a very dark chapter. 

 

But it is a new year, and with a new year I can turn the page. I'm sick of worrying if Michelle is going to take more of my work. For my sanity, I have to leave the frustrations and the exhaustion that this caused. I have no intention of continuing to go around in circles in 2026 or beyond.

So this is it. I'm done with staying at the negotiating table waiting for Michelle do the right thing! I'm going to get back to doing what I do best from my little workshop in Paraparaumu!

 

If you got this far—thanks!

Sharing this with you was what I needed, suffering in silence hasn't been fun—it's been cathartic to get it out. You know, at the best of times running a small business is hard work. It's no surprise that 2025 wasn't an easy year in business, so believe me when I say this with all the legal fees was a huge financial burden and stress I could have done without. 

 

If you are also in business be careful—it's not just Temu copying that you have to look out for. I have learnt my lesson, I was naïve to think that another woman in business wouldn't do this.

 

On refection, if this was to happen again, I don't know if I would have stuck with the expensive lawyer route for so long. I defiantly gave Michelle too many chances to do the right thing and sort this out, thinking that she would be reflective or remorseful. 

 

More fool me!

 

Thanks for all you support and replies it really helps to know I'm not doing this alone.

Jane

Owner and chief soap maker at Figgy & Co