The amount of plastic produced and thrown away each year has reached staggering levels. In fact, the United Nations estimates that some 400 million tons of plastic waste find its way into landfills each year.
Julia and Jordy Kay wanted to help reduce this number.
For Julia and Jordy Kay, something had to be done. Their idea: create a plastic-free cling wrap to replace traditional polyurethane, the kind of stuff often found in your kitchen cabinets.
“We were essentially the customers, and we just wanted a better product than plastic wrap,” Julia, who lives in Melbourne, Australia, says.
Together they launched Great Wrap in 2019, a materials science company that’s turning potatoes into compostable stretch wrap. Since its inception, Julia and Jordy have raised over $24 million and built their own production facility.
Great Wrap launched their pallet wrap in March of 2023. Great Wrap
But it wasn’t easy. Julia sat down with the Shopify team to share her tips for starting her own production facility.
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1. Find partners with beneficial resources for your brand
Julia and Jordy partnered with Monash University, a research-intensive university in Australia, welcomed angel investors, as well as received government grants in order to fund their business. “We kicked off a research project with Monash University converting food waste into a pathway to make a biopolymer, it’s been about a 2-3 year process and we’ve learned a lot,” Julia says.
On top of working with students and faculty at the university, they have investors and mentors like Simon Griffiths, founder of Who Gives A Crap, who served as guides along their development process.
“We’ve really always been attracted to investors who have built things themselves and have a really great understanding of what it takes to start from an idea and get it into a process,” Julia says.
2. Ask yourself, “How can my business benefit from its own production facility?”
Julia and Jordy found it was easier to set up their own manufacturing facility rather than contract with one. “We wanted to be able to experiment, and we were really excited about creating jobs too,” Julia says.
With their own facility, they not only have control over what goes into their product, but what is happening to the waste created after their product is made. “It’s important to zoom out from the product and think about that whole process,” Julia says.
By opening their own facility, Great Wrap is able to map out the entire life of its products, from what’s happening to the waste, to how that waste is being processed and discarded. The pair have been able to alter their formulas to improve the quality overtime, and design pathways with Monash University to begin setting up their own biorefinery on site.
Great Wrap co-founders Julia and Jordy Kay have opened up their own manufacturing facility in Melbourne, Australia.Great Wrap
3. Find support for the launch of your factory
“We were trying to be informative rather than too fun and confusing,” Julia says. When you’re building your factor you need to garner the support of your community as well as the larger network of business owners who can potentially use your product.
Julia and Jordy designed social media content around the development and growth of their factory, and after a few Instagram posts, 24 hours later Great Wrap had done nearly $30,000 in sales.
By sharing your facility progress on social media viewers can feel like they are a part of the building process, and in turn they will be more likely to make a purchase, and come back for more.
With the proper resources, support, and marketing strategies Great Wrap has been able to operate out of their own facility for a little over three years now, with plans to open a US based factory in the near future.
Tune in to the full Shopify Masters episode to discover what it takes to build your own production facility, and scale to gain international recognition.