The amount of plastic pouring into our oceans is set to triple by 2040, and the bulk of the un-recycled plastic in the world is generated by an enormous industry: consumer packaged goods (CPG). The world is rife with waste from such goods, but as people become more aware and look to minimize the waste they produce, tech startups are coming up with novel solutions to help people and companies meet their sustainability goals.
At TechCrunch Disrupt this week, we spoke with Svanika Balasubramanian, the co-founder and CEO of rePurpose Global, a “plastic credits” platform dedicated to making planetary action accessible; Brian Bushell, the co-founder and CEO of by Humankind, a personal care brand designed around reducing single-use plastic waste; and Lauren Singer, founder and CEO of Package Free, an online retailer that sells products that help us to live a zero or low-waste lifestyle.
The founders discussed how they plan to eliminate plastic and create valuable businesses at the same time, and shared insights about growing and succeeding in the sustainable tech space.
RePurpose Global has a gamified implementation in place to help companies reduce waste. “It’s really kind of two pieces,” said Balasubramanian. “One is the profit credit platform, and the second is the profit neutral certification, which allows CPG companies or any company to leverage the plastic credit platform and create impact through that.”
Balasubramanian aims to build on the weaknesses and strengths of the carbon credit space and apply it to plastic, since the vast majority of plastic goes unrecycled. On rePurpose’s platform, one plastic credit is the equivalent of one KG of a “nature bound” plastic waste that be eliminated.
RePurpose currently works with brands in 26 countries. In addition to the platform, the company removes plastic from the ocean off the coast of Bali, Indonesia, and sets up new recycling supply chains for municipalities and in low-income neighborhoods across the Global South. “The prospect of neutral certification is our way of bringing CPG brands and other companies into the fold as participants in the credit platform by allowing them to measure, reduce and offset their footprint.”
Bushell, of by Humankind, was inspired to create the company after finding plastic on the ocean floor during a vacation, and decided to tackle the issue from the consumer end of the market. He created a range of personal care products with a focus on reducing single-use plastics.
“We felt that we needed to attack the issue directly at the product itself,” said Bushell. “Our aim is to create easy-to-use products that are better for the planet than what you’re currently using.”
Reusing containers is one way by Humankind has used to help its customers reduce their plastic footprint. He said, “Most of our products are refillable in some way. So you keep the container and you refill it with something, producing a smaller amount of waste than you would otherwise use.”
“And another way, which is really a terrific way, is by eliminating the water factor in the product and making it yourself at home,” he added. The company ships many products in tablet form, such as mouthwash or toothpaste, to which customers can simply add water to make them usable.
Lauren Singer’s Package Free is more of a marketplace of plastic-free product. The founder tapped into a growing zeitgeist when she documented her journey away from plastic on social media, generating an enormous amount of interest. And when the pandemic struck, Singer saw interest growing in the products offered on her marketplace as people faced the fragility of our ecosystem.
“We started as a brick and mortar retail business with multiple stores in New York, pop-ups and places like Nordstrom. Throughout the pandemic, many retail locations closed, including ours, and we shifted our entire business online, which did incredibly well. Our customers not only stuck with us, but started buying a broader range of our products […] People for the first time, maybe ever, had to sit at home with the waste that they’re creating and really understand and spend time with it. They really felt the enormity of the plastic waste problem.”
Singer feels the pandemic and increasing “greenwashing” also made people question the authenticity of sustainable products. “Perhaps one of the other consequences of the pandemic is where it has revealed how fragile our ecosystem is and our society is and the dependencies. The onus definitely sits on the company to do their due diligence and think about what they’re putting out there.”
She said customers and companies are starting to see that there is a holistic problem, and it’s not just down to things like carbon credits or offsetting. “A commitment to reduce and redesign by 2050 is also not going to solve the problem, because you’re still doing something today.”
For its part, by Humankind, which has a plastic offset program to help customers achieve a “net neutral” plastic footprint, is tackling any allegations of “greenwashing” by partnering with a company called Plastic Bank to generate the offsetting. “The way that we support transparency is to have answers about how we’re sustainable for all of our products that are easy to understand and defensible,” Bushell said.
As awareness increases, people are also tightening scrutiny on companies and their products. “The most obvious way for anyone to see how smart customers are getting about the definition of sustainability is just look at the comments on Instagram and the questions that people are asking. They’re really asking how and why, which is really important. People want to behave sustainably, but above that, they want products that they love. They want products that work for them, and they don’t want to sacrifice the quality or the convenience that they had before,” Bushell said.
He feels the challenge today for product engineers, manufacturers and retailers is: How can they provide as good of a solution, or better, that is also sustainable?
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However, there is one major problem facing such startups: Funding. By Humankind has raised around $4 million, but Bushell says it’s hard to raise money unless you have a good product and passionate investors interested in sustainability.
“It’s impossible to raise money until you get someone to say, ‘Wow, that’s a great idea’, and if that person or group has a reputation, then it becomes easy, very quickly. There’s no question that this is going to be table stakes if it’s not already table stakes with consumer products. So I don’t think it’s a matter of investors coming up to speed anymore on investing in brands that have sustainability in their DNA,” he said.
Singer’s Package Free has raised as much as $12 million, according to some reports. She said, “More investors are passionate and attuned to sustainability than ever before, whether it’s having a sustainability mandate within their funds or having actual climate funds. However, CPG is a tougher space than climate tech. There’s a lot more money and a lot more opportunity for growth and scale and potential exits for investors in climate tech.”
Repurpose Global has taken a mix of seed funding and a grant approach. Balasubramanian said, “We went into it almost cautiously, which helped us become cash-flow positive at a very early stage. A lot of our scaling did come from revenue, but interest has been there from investors, accelerator programs, incubators and so on, and a lot of these kind of funding instruments go where the opportunity is. I think sustainability is the next frontier and it has a lot of untapped opportunity.”
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