Wellington bloke creates app to find the best pies around New Zealand

Us Kiwis love a good pie, and a Wellington man has created an app that’ll help us track down the best ones around New Zealand. 

In his spare time, Matt Carkeek has been developing an app called Mean Pies, that lets Kiwis share their favourite pie spots around the country, complete with photo and video uploads and a real-time rating feature. 

“Born out of a conversation over a couple of beers and a keen problem solving attitude, Mean Pies has hit the shelves ready to serve kiwis up a place to share pies and find a new Mean Pie spot,” the official Mean Pies website states.

The app launched at the start of March 2025, and it started to gain traction quickly.

"It's taken off pretty hard. Everyone is pretty excited about it," he told RNZ's Morning Report last year (2025).

"I'm still plugging away, still trying to make it better. It only really launched at the start of March, but we've already got about 300 registered accounts and about a thousand downloads."

And boy, it's grown since then.

The app allows users to see pie shops from around the country, click into them to see reviews left by other people - and if the pie in question looks like a bitta them, the app offers directions on how to get to the pie shop.

Carkeek also talked through the guidelines on how to review pies on the app: “Put up a photo of a fresh pie, and then a photo with two bites to show your structural integrity and a bit of what it's made of on the inside.”

The app also allows users to search pie shops in your local area, plus, if you wanna cut out all the sub-par pies, there’s a feature where you can search by rating to only get the crème de la crème of pie recommendations.

Mean Pies is available to download from the app store now. Perfect for an Easter roadie.