The New Zealand Shipping Company (NZSC) was a shipping company whose ships ran passenger and cargo services between Great Britain and New Zealand between 1873 and 1973. A group of Christchurch businessmen founded the company in 1873, similar groups formed in the other main centres, to counter the dominance of the Shaw Savill line controlled from London and the (Scotland-Dunedin) Albion line. There were seven initial directors: John Coster, chairman, George Gould Snr., (father of George Gould), John Thomas Peacock, William Reeves, Robert Heaton Rhodes, John Anderson, and Reginald Cobb (died 1873) representing the New Zealand Loan & Mercantile Agency.