Sarah Paiji Yoo, co-founder and CEO of Blueland, lived a zero‑waste life for about two and a half years before launching her $35 million eco‑cleaning business backed by Gwyneth Paltrow and Justin Timberlake. During this radical period, her family reused cloth diapers, ditched disposable coffee cups, swapped body wash bottles for bar soaps, and carried reusable utensils and mugs everywhere. She told Fortune that the effort was intense but the impact felt tiny.
"I went zero-waste with my family for about two and a half years. But during all of that, it wasn't lost on me that the impact my family was having was minuscule, teeny tiny," Yoo told Fortune. "And that's where I started to get this feeling, ‘Oh, I could have much greater impact if I give other people better choices."
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The Zero‑Waste Experiment That Sparked a Movement
The idea for Blueland formed during her maternity leave when Yoo questioned why most household cleaners were packaged in disposable plastic and largely made of water. She told The Helm that she began cold-emailing chemists on LinkedIn in 2018 to help her create a dissolvable cleaning tablet.
Yoo eventually partnered with chemist Syed Naqvi, who left his job to develop the formula alongside her and co-founder John Mascari. Using $75,000 in personal savings and consulting income, Yoo said in the interview with The Helm that she bootstrapped a year of research and development before launching the company.
"We spent a lot of time when we launched in 2019 talking about the ‘why?' Like, ‘Why should people care? Why is single-use plastic bad? Why reuse?'" Yoo told Fortune. "The end goal was purely just to build a successful business. So that education was really gratifying for me."
Launched in 2019, Blueland introduced concentrated tablets for hand soap, dish soap, toilet cleaner, and later added laundry and body wash, each designed to dissolve in water and shipped in refillable tins and compostable packaging, according to Fortune.
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Blueland is Scaling Zero Waste with Mass Appeal
Yoo's marketing instincts led her to appear on "Shark Tank," where she landed a deal with Kevin O'Leary. The televised pitch brought national exposure and served as a powerful brand launch, The Helm says.
By 2022, Blueland surpassed $100 million in lifetime sales and placed products in Whole Foods, Target TGT, and Costco COST, also selling over 10 million units. According to Fortune, the startup has raised over $35 million from investors including Gwyneth Paltrow, Justin Timberlake, Adrian Grenier, Thrive Market CEO Nick Green, and Rent the Runway co-founder Jennifer Fleiss. Over 95% of the company's funding came from women investors.
Blueland also achieved multiple certifications, including Cradle to Cradle, USDA BioPreferred, and EPA Safer Choice, affirming its focus on human and environmental health, according to the company's website.
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Blueland’s Mission is to Make Sustainable Living Effortless for Anyone
Blueland's core philosophy is to make sustainable living effortless for the average household as Yoo believes most people won't change unless the alternative is just as easy and effective, Fortune says.
"We really leaned into our mission," Yoo told The Helm. "If we had to be writing content around spring cleaning and cleaning hacks, it would crush my soul."
Yoo advises aspiring entrepreneurs to find a co-founder to share the weight and never build something they don't believe in. In the interview with The Helm, she credits the company's growth to a strong sense of mission and the support of a co-founder, describing entrepreneurship as both practical and deeply personal.
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