For serial entrepreneur Joe Budzienski, the urgency to solve a problem came in a less-than-glamorous place: the house cleaning aisle at Target, where the lines of bright green- and flashing orange-colored plastic detergent containers prompted him to ask a question.
"Why is everyone just grabbing plastic bottles, consuming them and then throwing them to the trash?" he said. "What's the point?"
As an outdoor enthusiast, Budzienski was painfully aware that plastic waste is one of the main causes of ocean pollution. He knew the numbers: annual consumption of plastic totals more than 320 million tons worldwide, and generates a garbage patch - currently two times larger than the size of Texas - now floating in the Pacific Ocean.
Seeing a direct correlation between plastic containers and ocean pollution led Budzienski to start ThreeMain, a Boston-based startup that sells aluminium bottles guaranteed for life and naturally derived cleaning products - currently for the bathroom, the living room and the kitchen - to refill the bottles, hence reducing plastic waste due to non-recycled on-shelf containers.
"Our company is a lifestyle company too: we're like the S'well for house cleaning," Budzienski said, referencing the Manhattan-based reusable water bottle company founded in 2010.
For Budzienski, ThreeMain is not the first experience as a founder, neither the first one in the house cleaning space. At age 23, he started a Boston-based house cleaning company to pay off his student debt. It worked: in the first eight months of business, the company generated more than 100 accounts, and was later sold.
Budzienski also sold his startup Gozaik to Monster in a 2014 deal that he said was "over $10 million." Gozaik was a web application enabling applicants to create a multimedia resume, and raised only an angel round, according to Budzienski.
Based in Brighton Center with a team of three people and one intern, ThreeMain has already gained some traction thanks to investors and two campaigns on Kickstarter and Indiegogo.
The company closed a seed round worth $600,000 from Shepard LLC (a group based in South Windsor, Conn.) in January 2018, when the company launched. On Kickstarter, ThreeMain beat its goal in seven days, raising $23,000. Currently, the products are in pre-sale stage on Indiegogo - with an official website launching on September 6.
Budzienski explained that the company works on a pouch-based refill model. After the (supposed) one-time purchase of the bottles, customers sign up to receive pouches with the products to refill them. Customers can opt for a $59 quarterly subscription or buy bottles and pouches on a need basis.
Pouches, Budzienski said, are recyclable as part of a company-led program, use 80 percent less plastic than a bottle and are stored in a fulfillment provider in Chicago. Another fulfillment provider in the U.K. is ready to start a supply chain there in quarter two, Budzienski said.
To reach potential customers, the company is launching a beta "evangelist" program in the summer with 50 house cleaners in the Boston area; if a customer signs up with ThreeMain using the house cleaner's code, he or she will get a credit to be converted in dollars at the end of the month.
"We're looking to raise $3 to $4 million towards the end of quarter four," Budzienski concluded.
