Josh Howard: It's like sustainability for dummies. How do I figure out hacks to make my life more sustainable without turning my daily routine upside down? I email people individually from my personal email address. I've got no time for like mass emails and stuff because I just don't think that you get the kind of investment emotionally the name of your business is the single most valuable piece of real estate that you could ever have. And on top of that, it's free to create.
[Voiceover]: Welcome to Add to Cart, Australia's leading e commerce podcast that express delivers all you need to know in the fast moving world of online retail. Every week, Nathan Bush from E Suite and an e commerce industry expert will share the news, research and insights that you need to know to keep you at the top of your game and of course, keep your customers Adding to Cart. Hello and welcome to Add to Cart. My name is Nathan Bush, host of Add to Cart and director at e commerce talent agency Espeet. Now, I've been called a hack on many occasions, let's not get into it. But today I think I've met a bigger hack than me. In a good way, of course. Today I have Josh Howard joining me. Founder of Single Use Ain't Sexy. Yep, that's the brand name. Single Use Ain't Sexy. He's come up with a unique product which is a massive hack to save time, save money and hopefully save the planet. He calls it the Broccoli for hand soap and it's got nothing to do with consuming it when you're hungover. I'm going to leave him to explain it, but in this chat we cover so much ground from how Single Use Ain Sexy's impact is not only in reducing over 100,000 plastic bottles from circulation, but also in removing water from the whole supply chain. We also discuss how it took 93 discussions with suppliers before he cracked the formula, how Josh raised their initial funding from their own supporters, and why he thinks Australians are a bit sick of subscriptions. Controversial. Plus, stay until the end or subscribe to the Add to Cart newsletter at add to cart.com to get 20% off your very own Single Use Ain't Sexy purchase. Perfect for the home or the office. So, thanks to our partners, Shopify plus and and Signet, here's our conversation with Josh Howard, founder of Single Use Ain't Sexy. Josh, welcome to Add to Cart.
Josh Howard: Thank you, mate. I'm happy to be here.
[Voiceover]: So good to have you with us. Now, we're here to talk Single Use Ain't Sexy. Tell us, what is it all right.
Josh Howard: Single use ain't sexy. It's a bit of a mouthful, but we created Australia's first dissolvable hand soap tablet and usable bottle. So I like to put it in layman's terms, which is basically, it's barocca for hand soap. And so you get one of our very sexy reusable glass bottles, fill it with tap water, drop a tablet in, takes about 20 minutes to dissolve, and then it pumps out as this beautiful thick foam hand wash that you wash your hands with. So when you're finished with the bottle, instead of chucking a plastic one into landfill, you refill it with tap water, drop another tablet in, and the whole cycle starts again.
[Voiceover]: Brilliant. So I kind of like the space food stick of cleaning.
Josh Howard: Yeah. Yeah. It's funny you say that, because I'm obsessed with waterless products and dehydrated products, and you'll probably hear me talk about this a lot in this chat, but I see us as owning the just add water category. And so anything that you can add water to, I think makes so much sense. And so that's the. That's the space that we're playing in, is products that you add water to at home and make them at home.
[Voiceover]: Brilliant. So how did your brain go to. I want to create a tablet that
Josh Howard: can be hand sloped because I was seeing waterless products be applicable to different categories and I thought, why is no one doing this in the personal care vertical? So if you think about this kind of concept, it's not necessarily reinventing the wheel, it's doing something that's existed for years. So as a kid, my brother and I drank powdered cordial that you mix water with or you go camping and you have powdered milk or powdered mashed potatoes or my granddad had denture cleaning tablets. So it's about finding new ways to expand something that's been done, but do it in a way that I think I wasn't really seeing. So marrying up sustainability and beautiful design with a cheeky sense of humor is something that I think there's a massive white space for the whole. This kind of. This sense that you can look good and do good and you don't have to compromise on having beautiful things just to be more eco friendly. And so I just thought there was massive scope to be doing that in different categories around the home and specifically in the personal care and the home cleaning space. So that was kind of the inspo. And now it's exciting because we're working on body wash and face Wash and shampoo tablets and everything that is previously water based. We want to tabletize it and create reusable packaging for everything.
[Voiceover]: That's really cool. And how did you know? Because your background, you don't come from this background. How did you know that it was possible to make a full container of hand soap out of a little tablet? Like when you were just kicking the idea around?
Josh Howard: I had absolutely no idea what I was doing, and I still don't. So don't be fooled. No one does is the big lesson I've learned over the last 18 months of doing this. It was one of those processes where you have no idea where to start. And so I ended up speaking to about 93 different manufacturers from everywhere and very relatively quickly narrowed it down to people who could make soap that weren't making tablets or. And then might be able to turn a soap into a tablet, or people that made tablets but had no experience making soap and then could. Could create a formula that was so. That could be tabletized. And so ended up finding someone who had a lot of experience making soaps and a bit of experience making tablets, and then finally found the right. The right partner. But you know what it's like. You start your business, you got no idea. You're googling manufacturers. You're hitting up people with experience to ask them for their advice. You're trying to figure out what podcasts do I need to listen to to become an expert. Like, it's. You hack your way into an mvp. I honestly believe that. Unless you're some sort of specialist in the field. But, you know, I'm a. I'm a passionate marketer and advertiser, so I have no background in formulations and that kind of thing. So it was about finding people who did and then kind of selling them on the vision and the dream and what I thought could be really, really cool and then leveraging their expertise in that way. So that's how it kind of started to come to be at the beginning.
[Voiceover]: That's cool. And how many dodgy tablets did you have to try before you found the one that you went, this is what we can go to market with.
Josh Howard: We went through a lot of samples. Weird fragrances. Some were too watery, some didn't wash your hands. It's so funny. Like, when we started, I was like, oh, why are we doing all these samples so much? Like, we're spending all our time on samples. Like, can't we just order these things? And then I quickly realized that the reason that you take your time and find the right, the right product is because nothing is going to work the first time. It actually takes a lot of refining and figuring out like what the best option would be by just trying it. So it probably has helped me my philosophy in a lot of other areas, not to just rush stuff, but actually be really considered about, you know, what you bring out, what you pursue, what you put resources behind, what's worth developing, what's not, that kind of thing.
[Voiceover]: We all know that feeling when items turn up damaged, customers are upset, retailers are upset, the postie won't be able to sleep at night. No one wins. Our partners at Signet helped online stationery and invitation store Paperlust eliminate this issue by introducing a sustainable protective packaging solution that helped eliminate transit damages to zero and create a beautiful unboxing experience. Signet has over 5,500 packaging solutions that help leading e commerce retailers step up their packaging game and helps posties sleep at night. Visit signet.net au to find out more. Did you develop Single Use Ain't Sexy before the COVID hand washing craze?
Josh Howard: Yes. Which was very, very odd timing. So, so everything was developed. We had all that inventory made. It had, it had arrived at our office like, because that was in the early days when we didn't have a 3 PL and we were obviously just packing everything ourselves and so it arrived at our office and then about three weeks later the first rumblings of COVID started and I'm from Melbourne and so at that point in Melbourne it was real mass panic. You know, that was when people were panic buying toilet paper and all that kind of stuff. And I thought, oh shit, like what do I do? Do we launch this? Like everyone was very unsure and then ultimately it was like, look, let's just go for it. We've got a soap business. So if you have to launch some sort of business until, you know on
[Voiceover]: a plateau for you there, isn't it?
Josh Howard: Yeah, a little bit. But very quickly it became clear that we were solving dual crises. So there was the immediacy of the public health crisis by helping people stay safe and hygienic by washing their hands. And then there's the ongoing single use plastic crisis and figuring out how we can help people to be more sustainable in a very easy way. My philosophy with sustainability is that unless you make it really, really easy for people, then people won't do it and there won't be mass uptake. And so our whole product and brand and aesthetic and function is about making it so easy for people that they feel like they're having a really significant tangible impact without having to put in any effort.
[Voiceover]: Yeah. Nice. And was it hard? Because obviously you've created this, this idea, you've, you've gone down the product path with the sustainability angle in mind and then Covid's hit and it's like, well, it's actually a public health thing as well. Was it hard putting that sustainability message out? Like, did that fall to the background for a lot of customers as the pandemic came in?
Josh Howard: Yes. And it felt really awkward for me because my initial motivation behind this business was obviously the sustainability angle because there was no pandemic to even speak of. Then I realized, well, you know, people using and buying our products are still being more sustainable just because they're using. So even if the messaging doesn't lead with that, the impact is still the same. And I am always fascinated with whether people's intention matches their action when it comes to sustainability. And the purest idealist in me would always say, oh, I want everyone to be well intentioned and 100% of the time I want them to be thinking about sustainability. But at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter what their motivations are. If they're using eco friendly products, then the impact is very tangible and it's exactly the same. And so then I chilled out a little bit about worrying that that message maybe wasn't the lead for a few months and obviously it was all about how we can help people wash their hands and stay clean all the time. But as we've gone on and Covid has sort of dissipated, but the obsession with hand washing hasn't. Overall, in general, I think that the messaging is still very much around washing your hands, but doing it in a way that saves plastic bottles from landfill.
[Voiceover]: Beautiful. And talking about impact, the last figures that I saw on Single Use Ain't Sexy is that you've saved a hundred thousand plastic bottles from landfill. Can you talk about the impact and the size of the business that you've grown so far?
Josh Howard: Yes. So it's been pretty exciting, I've got to say, to see your little embryonic idea turn into something that is affecting. I wouldn't say it's world changing scale at the moment, but that is definitely the ambitions for the business is how do we just scale our impact and be a really consequential player in the fight against single use plastic bottles. So the thing that is exciting is that every time you drop another tablet, another plastic bottle is safe from landfill. And I love the direct impact felt from using the product and had a lot of success with kids and young families. I think people like teaching their kids that, you know, you do this action and this benefit happens. It's very simple. It's like sustainability for dummies. Which is the part of the culture that I come from is how do I figure out hacks to make my life more sustainable without turning my daily routine upside down? It's just. It's exciting. You know, the bottles are designed to be used forever, so they're made from beautiful glass. They're obviously reusable. And so the idea and the model is that you buy the bottles once and then you get tablet refills back on a subscription, so you don't have to worry about running out of soap, and you can kind of set and forget it. And so I love the idea of helping people that maybe weren't the biggest eco worries in the world start to see that small, little incremental changes can make a difference. And I like to say I see single Usain Sexy is like the gateway drug into sustainability for people. So it's not the last place they come to be more eco. It's the first place they come. They see how easy it is to be impactful, and then all of a sudden, it's, what next incremental step can I make to kind of be more sustainable? So that's like the broader vision is we keep bringing out other products in that tablet form that can keep making different corners of your home green beautiful.
[Voiceover]: I can assume that your audience is fairly broad, but with a similar mindset. How do you decide what waterless products you go after and invest in next?
Josh Howard: Well, for the first year, I had no idea what I was doing, so I was just like, finger in the wind kind of stuff. And then I got a little bit more savvy about asking our customers and our community for their own opinions. So one of the interesting things about our business is about a year in, we did an equity crowdfund because I'd been bootstrapping the business until then, and we needed cash to scale our impact. And in normal terms, that basically just means buying a whole bunch of inventory so that we can sell it. And that means that every time we sell inventory, four or 10 plastic bottles are saved from landfills. So the more you sell, the more bottles that are saved. And what I loved is the campaign for the crowdfund was built around, like, owning a part of a future without plastic in it. And so what I have realized is that we crowdsource all different parts of our business and that includes our product development. So we now go out to our community all the time to get like high conversion rates on those. I email people individually for my personal email address. I've got no time for mass emails and stuff because I just don't think that you get the kind of investment emotionally or in terms of time from people. And so I'll go out and say, hey, can you fill out this two or three minute customer survey? And we actually just got just before there's a big strategy session about our product pipeline. And the next, the next product that we're developing now is a body wash. And it was overwhelmingly chosen by our customers as the next thing that they want. I think it's perfect. Goes from hand to your body, then probably up to your face, maybe on your hair. We're working on oral care stuff like toothpaste tablets and mouthwash tablets. And so asking people who already like the brand and already know what we do for their opinion has probably been the single most useful way to gather information. And obviously it's also the most simple and obvious. So it should have been doing it from the start. But it's been a good way to keep expanding our product development pipeline for sure.
[Voiceover]: And you mentioned to get that customer feedback, you reach out personally to customers and people in your network. Do you have any kind of automated systems, any hacks to kind of set up capture of that feedback as well?
Josh Howard: Yeah, the good thing about this podcast with you, Nathan, is that I can actually give like proper tips and hacks and tricks because people want to hear that. If I'm talking on a podcast about like home design, it's a little bit different. Okay, so I love a good hack like my entire life and work is now figured out like what's a shortcut, more efficient way that we can get what we need? So yeah, so I hit up individual customers and say, hey, you bought SOAP from us a few months ago. We're trying to grow our impact. I'd love it if you could just give us two minutes of your time. Send them a link to a type form that has 10 questions in it. Never more than 10 questions questions ever. Otherwise they don't do it. Ask a whole bunch of questions where they always have to have pre written or selected options, never open ended stuff because no one answers it properly. And then all those into an Excel doc. And then I get my team to basically translate it into consumable data and present it in 10 slides, each one on 10 slides. Then we make decisions and it's Funny. Like, you think you have to incentivize people all the time, and hey, get 10% off to fill out this feedback. If you just say, hi, I'm an Aussie founder, I'm trying to make a difference. Can you just give me a hand? Two minutes of your time. The uptake we had on those surveys was 65%. I know that it's a bit of a pain in the ass to have to go one by one, but sometimes it's a false economy to think otherwise. And I think time spent trying to personalize stuff can pay off immeasurably. And I found that with everything to do with the business, you know, a lot of the people that invested in us in our equity crowdfund, they were those same customers that I was reaching out to one on one in the early days. And I would be like, why? You know, why do you guys want to put some cash in? And they're like, because we just been following you. Like, we've been following the story and we feel like we know you a little bit, and it's those things that make a difference. So whenever you try to collect data, I always like to try and make it feel personalized. Now, there's probably people listening to this podcast with enormous businesses who don't think it's feasible, but you can always get a sample size of people with that level of one to one touch. And if, you know, if you can't do it yourself, get someone from your team to do it. It's just the fact that it's a person asking for their opinion.
[Voiceover]: It's funny you say that. My wife ordered some product from Ozhair and Beauty and Anthony's been on the show before. We work with him closely at E Suite. And she ordered and on the bottom of the order confirmation, he actually puts a little note from himself and saying, here's my email address if you have any feed or suggestions on how we can make this better. She emailed him because for some reason she listened to my podcast, which doesn't make sense because she's around me every day. Like, why would you even do that? But she emailed him and he replied within like an hour just to say thanks for being a customer. And you could tell it was handwritten as well, which I thought was phenomenal. And that power of that one on one and putting yourself out there as
Josh Howard: a real person, was that a physical, A physical note that he'd written on a physical piece of paper?
[Voiceover]: No, it was like a little bit of text, I think. Think at the bottom of the order confirmation.
Josh Howard: Yeah. Nice. You know, it's so funny. Like, I. Firstly, I can't believe your wife's listening to your podcast.
[Voiceover]: I know.
Josh Howard: And secondly, it's, it's interesting because we all have email addresses and we all live and die by what's in our inbox. So just because someone is the CEO or founder of an organization doesn't mean they're inaccessible. And I think one of the big, the fascinating insights that I have learned is that now you can get to everyone. You know, 20 years ago, you actually could not access people. I mean, at best, if there was some really high profile person, maybe you would write them a letter at the TV station. They worked out or something. But now I feel like I have really built a lot of this business off the back of cold outreach. Whether it is guessing an email address based on the format that someone else, their company has, which is obviously my fave, or DMing someone on LinkedIn, which is what, what, how I connected with you. I saw all these people doing your podcast. I thought, I'll hit, I'll hit Nathan up and see if he wants a guest. So there's nothing that you can't, there's no one that you can't get to. Now, it doesn't mean that they'll respond, but if your cold outreach is compelling enough, then obviously there's a high chance that they'll be responsive. So my trick is always make a really engaging subject line. So we just trademarked don't be a Tosser. It's a line we've been using for ages. So in every subject header, I basically say like, hey, Nathan, or hey, insert whoever's name, don't be a tosser. And all of a sudden it means people at least opening it and giving you a shot. So it's just amazing to me. What this business has done off the back of cold outreach can never be underestimated.
[Voiceover]: What about from a B2B perspective? Any tips for headlines or catchy subject lines that you found work?
Josh Howard: Okay, so two things. So number one, I think everyone is using LinkedIn wrongly. So LinkedIn, if you go on your LinkedIn feed, it looks like this shitty thing designed by like a cheap HR department from a brand that has no aesthetic. And if you create LinkedIn content that is in any way different or more engaging or personalized or feeling kind of amateurish, it cuts through and people think that it's very, very different to what you're seeing on the platform. And so I get hit up probably four or five times a day in my LinkedIn DMS and I just don't respond to anything because it is these weird rote written responses hitting me up where people sound like robots. Like business B2B. So business to business. Commerce is about connecting with people who represent a business. So philosophically, I don't think it's altogether that different from B2C in the sense that you're dealing with normal people. Like people who hit up single use Ain't Sexy are still talking to me or someone else on our team. So it's like there's no reason that we need to speak robotically or in like a really weird, stiff, overly formalized way. So I think that's probably one is just be casual and be colloquial, still respectful, but just be chill. And then the other on LinkedIn is put out the kind of content that you think would resonate with people working at businesses. And I think you'd be amazed by how receptive they can be to it.
[Voiceover]: I think 100% agree with your LinkedIn tips. They're spot on. Is like for some reason people's brains seem to switch when they get on LinkedIn. They press like the URL and then they go, oh, I better turn into the business robot. You're like, you're still the same person. We're going to see you in person. I'll talk to you on the phone. Why would you behave differently on there? So great tips in terms of reaching out and having community around you. Obviously it feels like we've got a really great sustainable startup ecosystem in Australia, obviously. Julie, flora and fauna. We've had Simon from who Gives a Crap. Daniela, thank you. Do you connect with those guys and do you. Is there like a little sharing network there that you have?
Josh Howard: Julie I really like, I know her a little bit. We've done a bit of stuff together. Simon I met, I interviewed on a show I was hosting and Daniel I haven't met. But they're three examples of people who I think have done exceptionally well in our Aussie community in this space. Other people who are amazing, like I think Jesse and Jono from Memo Bottle are absolutely killing it. I think like Julia and Jordy K from the Great Rapper. Absolutely killing it. There are so many people who are doing interesting things in this kind of. It's not, they're not, they're not all social enterprises and we're not a social enterprise. And I'll tell you about later why. But anyone in the impact space, I think I really, I don't know what it is. We're just, we're lucky. It's like, it's. Maybe there are a few really good early players and it's created a good culture where other people like us can then follow on and come through. But there's something special about the Aussie, you know, Data C and ecom brand sustainability scene. Like, I lived in New York for four years and there's an amazing ecosystem there too. And I thought, oh, when I come home, like, I wonder if I'll feel like it's not as engaging or energizing. And to be honest, it's the complete opposite. I've been, like, so impressed with how much interesting stuff is going on here in that space. And it's not just startups. Like, I hosted an event at L' Oreal last week about their Think Tank 2022, about how to be more sustainable. And I was like, this is cool. Like, big, big corporate brands, I think they're. I think they're like the second biggest advertiser in their category in Australia are thinking, how can we be more sustainable? And then how can we pull people like me and my peer group into their organizations to figure it out together? And so that, to me was validation that big corporates are looking at, you know, smaller startups in the Aussie ecosystem, thinking, oh, you guys are leading the charge in the sustainability space. Like, how can you help us? And it was a good reminder that you don't have to be the biggest player in town to be really impactful or really smart about how you do business.
[Voiceover]: They didn't lure you there to make you a big deal, did they?
Josh Howard: Not yet.
[Voiceover]: I think you're right, though, because especially in that space, obviously consumer goods are ripe for disruption. I think the customer in Australia is ready for that. And you'd know way more about this than I would because we've got a duopoly in supermarkets. So people are like, hey, do you want subscription toilet paper? Do you want a marketplace where we've vetted that everything is ethically produced? Do you want tablets that you don't actually have to go to the shops every and you have to worry about it anymore? Like, it's right for disruption and it's just nice that there's a green side to it as well.
Josh Howard: Yes. I mean, look, it's leveraging. It's leveraging trends that are happening in humanity right now. Like, if you think about the big things that are changing the way that we approach our lives and the culture, it's things like social justice, equality, both in terms of, you know, racial, sexual orientation, gender. It's sustainable consumption. How can we be more mindful about what we're doing to the planet? So the thing that I like about our business is, and I talk a lot about this too, it's, it's not a sustainability business that is like, that has a product. It's just a business that is sustainable. And flipping that dynamic is the future of sustainable business and sustainable consumption. Because every business should be sustainable. You shouldn't just have a little pool of these few niche businesses that are sustainable. The idea is you're integrating greener and more eco friendly practices into everything that you do. And that's one of the things I loved about dealing with l' Oreal last week is we were looking at full supply chain stuff. I'm like, oh, this is amazing. You guys are thinking about what palette wrap you're using. You're thinking about what happens to the bottles after people are done with their shampoo. So it's funny because I don't look at this as a social enterprise and I don't look at it as a sustainable business. Those things are inherently part of our model, but they're not the defining features, if that makes sense.
[Voiceover]: Yeah, it does, it does. And I don't think you should ever apologize for being a business that is sustainable. You know what I mean? Because you've got a product that is green doesn't mean you have to be a social enterpr. And I think a lot of people just assume you are.
Josh Howard: And I think that a much for me personally. I think my, I guess my entrepreneurial thesis is that if you create a product and a business model where by virtue of the fact that people simply using your product, they're making an impact, I think it's a way more scalable opportunity to really, really have a significant impact. Because that means the much more, the more that you grow, the more that your impact scales as well. So that works for me and for us and I'm really proud of it. I'm really happy that we're, we've gone down that path.
[Voiceover]: Mustard Made make lockers. Get that? Mustard Made made lockers. Mustard Made made lockless. Mustard Made make lockers. But these aren't your typical old sandwich in the back pen. Sam Anderson poster on the inside lockers. These are beautiful, bright lockers that are in demand all over the world. So in demand that when Mustard Made went to expand from the AU and UK into the US they needed a platform that would handle the expansion. And down the hallway, skates shopify Plus, Mustard Made implemented Shopify plus in just two weeks, including a new Wishlist feature, upsell feature, features in cart, and personalized product recommendations. The result was a successful US launch and an increase in average order value of 15%. That takes them straight to the top of the class. To read more of Mustard Made's story and see other case studies, visit the customer sections on shopify.com au/. We talked a little bit there around packaging and things like that. I know one of your challenges has been how do you package up tablets so that they can go through the post without dissolving if they get, you know, subject to water? And how do we do that in a sustainable way? Have you solved that problem yet?
Josh Howard: Okay, really, really good question. So our whole business is about taking water out of the supply chain. And so the idea of sending tablets in the post is to replace sending single use plastic bottles full of water on a ship. So the way I describe it is instead of having a million water bottles on a ship full of liquid soap, you might have four pallets of our tablets. Right. So you're minimizing people's carbon footprint on the back end and then you're helping them save single use plastic bottles on the front end. So for us, sending these things by post has always made sense. Number one, it's cheaper for us because they're really light. So the tablets are 4 grams each instead of say a 250ml bottle. And then the second part is that it's easy for storage when it gets to someone's home. So wholesale is really interesting for us. We're starting to do some big wholesale deals now. Can you imagine a hotel that has 100 rooms, but instead of needing thousands of bottles of soap, they could have maybe a box of our tablets. So there's all these different ways that I think it appeals to people. The tablets come in, they're individually wrapped, but then they come in like a cardboard, like basically like a cardboard envelope that's a centimeter thick. So you're holding one of the envelopes up and it equals 10 plastic bottles saved from landfill. And I think it's often a bit of a penny drop moment when people are like, oh, that's awesome. My subscription just arrived and it saved 10 bottles from landfill. So something that's been important for us from an E commerce perspective is when you have a brand that's, that's, you know, predominantly digital, constantly telling people about your impact at every touch point and every communication is really important. Just keep hammering at home. And so I think of every time that we communicate that message to people as another branded experience, whether it is a your order is on its way, email or a DM from us checking in how the product's going is you just want to keep extending the sustainability message from the entire kind of start to end of the process. Yeah.
[Voiceover]: And that must be somewhat of a dream, that packaging situation. From a freight and a postage scenario, I can hear the logistic nerds just going, oh, imagine if I could do that. You've got a $3 flat rate shipping on site. So how are you sending your subscription products out in the mail?
Josh Howard: So you get 10 tablets, right. And they're all put in that thin cardboard envelope, which is effectively like a letter size. And so I think if you are wanting to get into E commerce, you want to find products that light because the thing that kills your margins are heavy freight costs. Both freight from your manufacturer or your supplier, whether that is by air, sea or truck, you know, or train or rail. But then you're also paying for freight on the customer end because they order their products and somehow the products have to get to them and you, more often than not, you're paying for it or paying for some of it. And so you want really light products. So, yes, our bottles are not that heavy, but they are, they're glass bottles. And so our model is to get as many people onto the subscription as possible because our freight costs are so much cheaper when people are just buying the tablets, given they're so light. Yeah.
[Voiceover]: And are you finding that the subscription model is sticky because it's obviously trending at the moment. Do you find that that momentum is continuing or are people coming off the subscription bandwagon?
Josh Howard: It's a good question. I actually think people are a bit sick of subscriptions. So I think the fact that it's trending is almost worked against other subscription businesses at the moment because people feel like, how many bloody subscriptions can they actually have? And so the big lesson for me has been, yeah, subscriptions suit us really well from a financial perspective and from an impact perspective. But what you actually want is you want people to try the product first and love it and then get them to subscribe. And at the start I think we were getting frustrated because we're like, I want more people getting a subscription up front. And then I thought, well, hang on, I'm not buying subscriptions to stuff that I haven't tried before. Like, if I'm going to invest my hard earned children's inheritance into products or anything, I want to make sure that it's valuable and that it has value adds value to my life. And so I think now we are much more conscious about trying to make people stick. After that initial one time purchase, we're still selling subscriptions up front, don't get me wrong. But I think the longer term play and the smarter strategy is to let people try it first and then upsell them to a subscription.
[Voiceover]: Yeah, that's really interesting. It's interesting that that's what you're saying because I'm definitely hearing a lot of that as well. But I think what you said around changing mentalities too. So it's almost like even if they try single use ain't sexy and they do it for a little while, they might drop off, forget their subscription, forget to reorder that feeling of guilt when you actually buy hand wash at a supermarket. I know we did it. We subscribe to who Gives a Crap and then we ran out and then we had to buy supermarket toilet paper which is wrapped in plastic, all that sort of stuff. And we actually felt really guilty, whereas before we tried it, we actually didn't even feel guilty because we didn't know there was an alternative.
Josh Howard: It's funny, like I feel guilty now if someone hands me a plastic bottle of water, like I'm just like, like I have that thing in me. It's like not, don't want to do it. And it's because I am rolling around with my memo bottle, my reusable memo bottle, which, you know, saves hundreds of plastic bottles a year from landfill because I drink probably five or six of them a day. So it's funny, it's a, it's a, it's a behavioral shift and it's a cultural thing where whether you know it or not, you start feeling guilty about not doing what you know is a better option. I think for us, we're very intentional about not guilting people because I think it feels like shit to be shamed into doing anything. Especially like, you know, you're a little kid and your mum or your dad are nagging you to do something, what are you going to do? The exact opposite. Just piss them off. So I feel like, you know, we're, we're the same way in terms of being preached to, especially as adults. People don't want to be preached to. They don't want to be told their shit. They don't want to be told that what they're doing isn't good enough. So our job has been to create a brand and a community around talking about the fun, cheeky, irreverent side of sustainability and conscious consumption, and make it something that is fun rather than something that feels like a drag or like people are being nagged to. And that has been a big part of our success, is that rather than pushing people away from what they're doing, we're pulling them towards us by talking about the virtues of what we're doing.
[Voiceover]: Yeah. And talking about branding and fun. Obviously, your background is advertising and marketing. The name single use ain't sexy isn't an obvious name. Did you go through heaps of testing or did you just go, no, that's it. Let's just get it to market?
Josh Howard: I didn't go through a formal testing. I'm not a formal tester type of person. I'm more gut feel. But I was definitely wanting something that stuck out. I think in the sustainability space, there's not a lot of brands that are making a really impactful punch by being kind of out there and different. And I thought there's a big white space for that, both in terms of esthetics and design, which is why all our products is black and white. A lot of other things in the space of pastels and soft tones and greens and that kind of thing. My personal view is that the name of your business is the single most valuable piece of real estate that you could ever have. And on top of that, it's free to create. And so nothing drives me more nuts than seeing brands or companies that feel uninspired or boring. And so I'm very much the type of person that wants to create a brand and not a product. You know, like, I could be making a lot more money a lot more quicker doing whatever. But my passion is creating, like, an intentional brand that I think has legs and will be really, really commercially viable and impactful for a long time to come. And so the name, I think, is the single most important component, because here's what happens. Everyone is living in such a saturated market, and Every category has 10 competitors overnight, including us, after we started as the first, that unless you have something that hooks people on, you will just dissipate in the sea of competition. And so what? For me, when people hear the name, they hook onto this idea where it's like, oh, what's that? Oh, I want to know more. And it makes you really distinctive and that you can't pay for. It's really hard to pay for that kind of interest. And so I think that with all our stuff, like our tagline is that we. That we just trademarked is don't be a tosser. On the inside of our packaging, it says, let's get wasteless. We had T shirts on them which say, reuse me on the back. So it's bringing in this kind of, you know, these double entendres and a bit of sexual innuendo that is not. It's not too risque. It's. It's cheeky without being gratuitous. And I think there's a very fine balance. And early on in some of our brainstorming sessions, you're coming up with all sorts of different stuff and sometimes it's just like, no, no, no, that's. That's too dirty or it doesn't work, or if it's. If it's. If it's so. If it's so out there, it loses the. The nuance and the intelligence that the brand really represents, which is, you know, a wink and a nudge. But dealing, I say, dealing with a really serious issue, but in a fun way.
[Voiceover]: Any bits of creative genius you've left on the cutting room floor that you want to share with our audience?
Josh Howard: I have this document with all of my ideas, which, of course, I think are genius. And I'm sure none of them are probably workable. I don't know, you might have the same. You might have the same sort of thing going on for your business. But, yeah, I mean, I've got so many ideas endlessly, and I think some of them work now, some of them will work for other businesses and other ideas that we're going to do. But I think one thing I love is crowdsourcing ideas. I think my ideas are always really good when other people help create them. So, you know, this is the thing, is, I think we're often surprised by who we have in our network that we haven't leveraged. And by that I mean, you know, your mates, your mates, siblings, parents, people's partners, people you work with, like people that you used to work with that, you know, loved you when you worked with them, and you give them a buzz and say, hey, can we catch up for a coffee and get some ideas off you for half an hour? So I think one of the big learnings for me was asking people who I already knew for help rather than always trying to seek out new people who I thought had all the answers,
[Voiceover]: you know, And I think we underestimate, too, how much people love being asked for their opinion and how much they want to help. Because you rarely get no's, right?
Josh Howard: Totally. People adore feeling like they are being influential in your decision making. I think the key for me is not asking too many people for their opinion, but figuring out a few strategic people whose opinions I really respect or who are specialists in whatever space I'm asking them about and then kind of gathering the information to. To make whatever decision you want. But I will say this. We all have this thing inside us which is a gut feel when we just know that something should be a certain way. And usually I think that that is right now that can be curated a little bit from outside influence and interference. But it's funny, like, often you'll have a gut feeling. You'll do this big process to get everyone's opinions and then you end up back where you were, which is okay. Yeah, yeah. Part of the process.
[Voiceover]: That's right. Josh, we've covered so much ground. What's next? What are you excited about? About? Single use ain't sexy. For the next year or two, I'm
Josh Howard: really excited about bringing out other products. I reckon that is our sweet spot. I think it is a really, a really practical way to help people be more sustainable, but in different product categories. So body wash and face wash and shampoo and, you know, mouthwash tablets and toothpaste tablets and home cleaners and all that kind of stuff. So we're spending a lot of time on product development. I think for anyone who has a business who wants it to be viable long term or potentially sell it one day, you have to have a really robust product pipeline. And that means that it's not just about bringing one thing out. I think I made a whole steak early on thinking, oh, we'll just bring out the soap and it'll be great. But the reality is successful brands have a lot of different products and that is how they're increasing their aov. So it's really hard to sell people more products if you don't have them. So having a robust kind of innovation arm of the business is important. So I'm really excited about that. International markets I think make perfect sense for us. So a few strategic places with a focus on the US So if I'm talking to you in a couple of years, I would expect by then we'll will have launched in the US and then the other big piece for us is wholesale. So how do we get our soap into, you know, restaurant bathrooms, cafe bathrooms, corporate office bathrooms, gyms, fitness studios. Like I am a very passionate, physical person and I love the idea of bringing our brand out of an Instagram feed and into the real world. And when you have a physical product, you have to figure out ways to get people to try it. It's this whole, you know, try before you buy. This idea that if you try something, the likelihood that you'll buy it is so much greater. And so I see bathrooms as our Runway. That is the real estate where people can sample our products. It's not like we have a food product and you can stand in the supermarket and someone can try it. And so figuring out how to access people in the right bathrooms is a big priority for us now over the next year.
[Voiceover]: Very smart. Now, this isn't a very smart question, but when you said about getting people to try it, have you ever heard any stories about people who may have mistaken the tablets for a mint and pop them in the mouth?
Josh Howard: In the very, very, very early days, one of my mates said that his housemate ate it when he was hungover because he was desperate for a mint. Now, thank God that that's not happening anymore because we have very, very clear warning labels now and everything. And that's probably my background as a lawyer. I want to make sure that we are protected and protecting our customers as well. So we now have written in huge letters on every single individual tablet, it says soap tablet. And then there's also warnings on all the boxes and stuff like that. But, yeah, that was a. That was a very good reminder early on that we need to be very clear with people about what it is.
[Voiceover]: It's not only sustainability for dummies, it's soap for dummies as well. Totally.
Josh Howard: And that guy was fine. Let me assure you. He was fine. He was a bit hungover, but other than that, he was fine.
[Voiceover]: Great. Josh, how can people reach out and get in touch? What's the best way?
Josh Howard: Visit us on our website. So single use ain't sexy dot com. One thing I always say to people is, I'd love you to follow us on Instagram. So ingleuse ain't sexy? Look me up on LinkedIn. I love LinkedIn. I think it's a really interesting platform that can be used in lots of different ways. So I'm Josh Howard on LinkedIn. And then I thought we could do a little exclusive offer for the add to cart community. So if people. If people are keen to try the soap, they can get 20% off and use the code ADD2CART. So a D, D, T O, C A R, t and then 2,0. So add to cart 20 for 20% off.
[Voiceover]: Beautiful. Thank you very much for extending that offer. I'm sure I will be on there and I'll be purchasing and changing our soap over. So appreciate it.
Josh Howard: Josh.
[Voiceover]: Love the story so far and no doubt if and when we speak again in a few years time the story will be changed again.
Josh Howard: Hopefully. Hopefully. And I should say one last thing too. If anyone wants to email me for questions or you want advice or anything like that, I'm joshingleuseanksexy.com and I'll respond to anything that comes in.
[Voiceover]: How good. Thanks Josh.
Josh Howard: Awesome. Thanks Nathan.
[Voiceover]: Now if you loved the sound of Broca for hand wash, get over to single use ain't sexy.com Josh has given Add to Cart listeners 20% off their first order. Simply add the coupon code addtocart20. That's Add to Cart 20 or one one word to get your 20% off. Just don't eat the tablets here are the three biggest lessons I got from today's chat with Josh. Number one Lazy beats sustainable. Sustainable is really up for it, right? Josh hit on the point that unless you make it really, really easy for people, then people won't go out of their way to be sustainable. The product that Josh has created here is easy to store, easy to use, easy to dispose of, and is cheaper than alternatives. Oh, it also happens to be sustainable now. If you're asking customers to change behaviors for a bigger purpose, you need to address and appeal to those smaller and more personal barriers first. Number two simple surveys. Josh sends all customers a follow up survey asking for feedback. His golden rules make it personable rather than a reward for discount. No more than 10 questions, no open ended answers and present back to the team the findings with no more than one slide per question. Get those insights out. Three Real Asks don't hesitate to reach out for help or favours from those who may have come before you, but when you do, don't automatically made it. Josh has developed a huge network around him from doing the grunt work of genuinely creating connections for those big problems he's trying to solve. There's no shortcut sales template or workflow automation. His asks are personal and direct and it's paying off big time. To get the highlights of today's episode, head on over to add to cart.com and sign up for our free newsletter each Tuesday. We will send Monday's episode summary links and discount codes for you to go next level on. And if you're looking to explore your next E commerce opportunity, come and visit us at E Suite. We're a dedicated e commerce talent agency connecting the best e commerce talent with the fastest growing brands in Australia. Head on over to esweettalent.com where you can download the free E Commerce Salary Guide and sign up to our weekly E Commerce Job Emails. Thanks for listening. And until next time, keep those customers adding to cartoon.
