She Won 3 Olympic Gold Medals. Now She's Coming for a $460 Billion Industry
Earthletica on Flaunter
She spent two decades as one of Australia's greatest swimmers. Now Bronte Campbell is channeling that same obsession into building a brand she believes the world actually needs.
For most of her life, Bronte Campbell's mornings started at 4am.
Training. Racing. Recovering. Repeating. For over two decades, her entire existence was organised around the pool. Three Olympic gold medals, multiple World Championship titles, and a career that made her one of the most decorated swimmers Australia has ever produced.
Then, earlier this year, she walked away from it all.
"I have been organising my life around swimming since I was seven years old," Bronte said. "And maybe it's time to have another organising feature."
That feature already exists. It's called Earthletica - and if Bronte Campbell applies even half the discipline she brought to elite sport, the activewear industry should be paying attention.
The Decision to Step Away
Life outside the pool had simply become too important to put on hold. Her marriage to Benfield Lainchbury, celebrated earlier this year in a ceremony that famously included a mid-ceremony ocean swim ("half the guests thought I was joking"). Her friendship with her sister and fellow retired swimmer Cate Campbell. And a business she had been building quietly, with conviction, since 2020.
The Problem She Couldn't Ignore
The seed of Earthletica was planted when Bronte started pulling on the thread of what her activewear was actually made of.
The activewear industry generates 42 million tonnes of waste every year. Most garments are made from new plastic that can take hundreds of years to break down in landfill. And the chemicals used to treat performance fabrics - to make them sweat-wicking, quick-drying, UV-resistant - can be absorbed through the skin, and overtime, build up in people’s bodies and affect their hormones.
"Most activewear is just made straight from new plastic," Bronte says. "The chemicals used in this process are harmful, there has to be a better way."
For someone who swims in the ocean almost every single day, this wasn't an abstract concern.
"The idea of what the world is going to look like if we continue the way we're continuing now - it didn't really sit right with me."
What She Built Instead
Co-founded with fitness entrepreneur Libby Babet, Earthletica is designed to close the gap between high performance and sustainability.
Every garment is made from recycled and/or organic materials. Every fabric is tested to be free of more than 1,000 harmful chemicals - currently the highest standard available anywhere in the world (OEKO-TEX 100). The brand holds B Corp certification, placing it among a small group of Australian businesses verified to meet the highest standards of social and environmental performance.
But Bronte is quick to point out that sustainability was never meant to come at the cost of performance.
"We have found that most people are not willing to compromise on function and comfort to achieve sustainability," she says. "So we didn't ask them to."
The result is a range of women's activewear that performs under pressure, fits the way an athlete actually moves, but is made using recycled and/or organic materials and is tested free from harmful chemicals. You can explore the full collection at earthletica.com.
Built for Women, By Women Who Actually Train
There's another dimension to Earthletica that Bronte feels just as strongly about.
Only six per cent of all sports science research is conducted on female bodies. The activewear industry has largely followed suit - designing for performance data that was never collected on women in the first place.
"We deserve a little bit more attention to detail," she says. "You're not just taking research that's been done on male bodies and assuming it's going to be the same for women."
Every piece in the Earthletica range is designed specifically with the female body in mind, from the cut and compression to the way fabrics respond to a woman's physiology during training. This includes how chemicals interact with women’s hormone profiles. This is an emerging area of research, and something Earthletica takes seriously by testing to check these chemicals are not present in their finished pieces.
A Brand Already Gaining Momentum
The immediate priority, Bronte says, is getting more Australians to discover what Earthletica stands for.
"To date, we have spread through word-of-mouth and organic growth, so telling more people about us is the first priority."
She's also clear on the bigger picture. Earthletica's goal is to become a global brand. The ambition is as big as anything she ever set herself in the pool.
The Next Chapter
At 32, Bronte Campbell is rehabbing a ruptured ACL, recording a podcast with her sister Cate, planning her next moves as a founder, and for the first time in her adult life, waking up when she wants to.
She's not slowing down. She's just pointed in a new direction.
"It's got to be worth it regardless of just one result or one outcome," she says. "Did I do everything I could, with integrity and wholeheartedness? If I can say I did that - that is success."
For anyone who wants to train the way an Olympic champion does - and wear something built to match - Earthletica is worth a look
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Bronte Campbell