About Us

SummerGlow Apiaries is a New Zealand beekeeping company run by husband and wife team, Bill and Margaret Bennett.
We have 750 hives located in the greater Waikato area in the North Island of New Zealand.
The Waikato is renowned for its clean green pastures and is a very productive dairy area. The surrounding hill country is used for sheep and cattle farming. And the more remote areas are covered in the beautiful New Zealand native bush.

Bill has had a lifelong interest in beekeeping. His uncle was a beekeeper in the Waikato from shortly after the end of World War 2 and during his school holidays Bill would regularly help him with work on the hives. Not only did his uncle give him a love for bees, but also an appreciation and knowledge that honey can heal cuts, wounds, burns.

In 1976 Bill set up his own beekeeping business after spending several years training and working as a Quantity Surveyor in Hamilton.

We produce a variety of honeys from New Zealand native trees such as manuka, kanuka, rewarewa and kamahi as well as pasture honey.

We also produce propolis, a natural anti-biotic which is gathered by the bees to seal up the hive and to provide the hive with protection against bacterial infection. Propolis is manufactured into many health-giving products which many people find beneficial to their health.

In April each year, the New Zealand autumn, we supply bulk live bees to another beekeeper who exports them together with a queen bee to Canada in preparation for the Canadian spring.

When the news came out in 1991 from The University of Waikato about the healing properties of UMF Manuka Honey we concentrated our efforts into the production of this exciting and unique honey.

This involved establishing different hive management practices to ensure that our manuka honey is as pure as possible and not mixed with other honeys.

We do not use any drugs or chemicals for disease control in any part of our beekeeping operation.

In 1995, after realising how little is really known about UMF Manuka Honey and that very little was being done to promote this special honey, we set out to inform people of its natural properties so that those with a need can benefit from it.

Our aim is to provide information and to make it clear that this property is not found in all manuka honey as has been commonly thought. Knowing this, people will be better informed when purchasing the honey.

In 1995 we established the very first website about manuka honey. Seven years ago our website was one of just two honey websites worldwide, now there are dozens.

We have established a mail order service sending highest quality honey to customers in many countries around the world. It excites us to hear back from many happy people who have benefited from using SummerGlow UMF 16 Manuka Honey.

We are very grateful to Dr Molan for his dedicated research and knowledge. Many people worldwide have benefited greatly from the findings of his years of passionate study into the healing qualities of honey. Many of these people had previously had conditions for which no other treatment had been effective.

*"The Lord Is Our Light And Our Salvation."