Good for the earth is good for business for these five Aussie success stories

Jordy and Julia Kay came up with the idea of creating a compostable cling wrap after seeing just how much waste was being caused by their respective industries (Julia was an architect, Jordy was a winemaker). After two years of developing their product, the Kays launched Great Wrap, the world’s first certified compostable pallet wrap in March 2020.

This very clever plant-based biopolymer wrap breaks down in a compost pile in under 180 days and leaves behind no toxins. In landfill, it’ll take a couple of years but that’s a piece of cake compared to 500+ years it takes with plastic.

Attracting a global audience with sales on Amazon Launchpad, Great Wrap is now in a position to set up a manufacturing facility in Australia where they hope to produce a marine-degradable biopolymer. It’s a vision well worth clinging to.

The seeds for Seed Organics’ success were sown back in 2019. Launched by founders Nate and Jules Dureau in collaboration with an Australian biochemist, this all-natural cleaning product range started selling to commercial customers looking for non-toxic, high-performance alternatives. We’re talking germ-friendly places like day care centres, medical centres and food production facilities.

Then COVID happened and cleanliness became top of mind for all of us. For Seed Organics, their powerful non-toxic, alcohol-free washes and sprays earned them international recognition as the most effective, environmentally safe and pH neutral formulations of their kind, killing 99.99999 per cent of bacteria, viruses and pathogens (as approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration).

In late 2020, Seed was approached by Amazon Launchpad to develop their ecommerce presence. It’s a move that’s helped expand and diversify their audience as they expand into international markets.

“Sustainability is not just about the development, production and packaging of products,” Nate tells Kochie’s Business Builders. “It is about how sustainable the actual usage of the products is – many toxic-based cleaning and household products are not designed to be used with the same frequency that they are being applied in a post-COVID world, which could lead to adverse health outcomes in the future.”

Niki’s Natural Wipes are the world’s only all-natural baby wipes infused with soothing organic coconut oil and antibacterial Manuka Honey essence for babies with sensitive skin.

Suthan and Durka Naganayagam founded their business after their baby son Niki was hospitalised with a urinary tract infection and had ongoing nappy rash issues. With backgrounds in healthcare, science and technology, Suthan and Durka did their research and formulated a 100 per cent natural combination of organic ingredients that helped Niki’s nappy rash disappear.

Made of ethically sourced wood pulp cloth, Niki’s Natural Wipes are completely biodegradable and decompose at a much faster rate than most baby wipes. It’s a product that’s resonated with parents around the world looking for harmful chemical and toxin-free wipes that’s good for baby skin and the planet too.

What happens when you love the ocean but you don’t love the plastics used in your favourite ocean activity? You do what carpenter Rikki Gilbey did and launch WAW Handplanes, a bodysurfing brand that’s riding a new wave of sustainability.

The Sydney brand sells two types of eco-friendly handplanes: The first is the WAW BadFish, made from recycled ocean plastics collected from the Great Barrier Reef. The second is the WAW Timber handplane. WAW plants a native tree for every timber handplane sold, with more than 4000 trees planted so far.

Rikki’s mission to take his quality handplanes to the world has been accelerated since he won an Amazon Launchpad Innovation Grant in 2020.

“Our online orders and eCommerce revenue is up well over 100 per cent on last year, and a large part of that can be attributed to joining Amazon,” Rikki says. “Not only through direct sales but also the awareness the Launchpad has created around our brand and products.”

Children’s book authors Tiegan Margetts and Stu French saw a gap in the market for beautiful picture books that tell meaningful stories to kids about changing the world.

Enter Ethicool Books, a children’s book publisher and retailer based in Melbourne. With titles aimed at children aged zero to six, Ethicool Books cover topics like environmental responsibility, equality and mental health in charming ways that motivate kids to make our planet more equitable and sustainable.

Launched at the beginning of 2020, Ethicool Books became especially relevant for families stuck at home during the pandemic looking for different story time choices. Their books are now in the hands of tens of thousands of children across more than 50 countries.

Ethicool Books is also part of the 1% for the Planet movement, meaning that they devote one per cent of their annual revenue to sustainability not-for-profits.