Founders Q+A: NOICE and the toothpaste revolution
NOICE and the toothpaste revolution
ESGmark® members NOICE are on a mission to make it into your bathroom. Their unique Dental Gel offers a long overdue, zero-waste alternative to boring, synthetic, wasteful traditional toothpaste. NOICE's Dental Gel disrupts and reshapes consumer dental care habits to make sustainable behavior simple, thoughtful, and lighthearted.
We speak to co-founder Morgane Soret about NOICE’s start-up journey, their founding principals and where they’re going next.
ESGmark®: What do you think the role of business should be in alleviating climate change?
Morgane Soret: Climate change is a complex topic. My vision is actually that climate change is not the issue by itself, but a symptom of the real challenge of our generation: Our linear consumption model. I think that businesses are the birthplace for environmental change. The role of innovators, entrepreneurs, in my point of view, is key to reinvent & propose circular and sustainable alternatives.
I am French, so by nature, I have to admit I complain (a lot), and at some point I was tired of complaining and wanted to be part of the solution, and this is why we created NOICE, to offer sustainable solutions to oral care essentials. So yes. businesses have a huge role to play when it comes to choosing their development strategy but also with internal policies. I often feel, as a consumer myself, a lot of pressure when it comes to the urge of shopping more sustainably. As waste is a design flaws, businesses and companies have the mission to offer more accessible sustainable choices.
Businesses can truly reshape our consumption habits to follow this circular model for a sustainable future.
ESGmark®: What has your biggest lesson been since founding NOICE in 2019?
MS: We are 4 co-founders at NOICE. Sharing very different and complementary backgrounds and all animated by the urge of proposing sustainable solutions.
Since founding NOICE in 2019 one of the biggest lessons we learnt is maybe the lack of awareness when it comes to the climate change topic actually. When you evolve in a certain area you can have the tendency to think that the people around you have reached the same conclusions & feelings. Not true. This is why it is always very important to keep on having an educative approach, stay humble and keep learning ourselves along the way.
The second biggest lesson would be how deep the change needs to be in order to truly offer sustainable solutions. In all areas of the business itself, its supply chain, its internal management and much more. It comes first from having a holistic approach, looking at sustainability in all the areas. Assess, monitor and improve. A concrete example for NOICE as an eCommerce brand was to find a fulfillment partner (the one that prepares and ships the orders) that will be able to follow our plastic-free guidelines. Believe it or not, but that was not an easy task.
It is something we are also very proud of because we worked with our fulfilment center to be able to achieve a plastic free delivery but also to propose this service to their other customers!
ESGmark®: If you could change one thing as part of the NOICE journey so far, what would it be?
MS: That is a very hard question to answer. So of course there are tons of elements we could have done differently and that if we would redo it today with the knowledge we gained over the past years would be very different. At the same time it is the way it is and we prefer to focus on the positive, the future, the learnings that being too much stuck in the past, if that makes sense.
ESGmark®: The branding for NOICE is so much fun - but really delivers a serious message - how do you come up with your marketing ideas?
MS : First of all, thank you! I am glad that it is what you see because it was exactly our objective to create a brand that would raise our voice with NOICE, in a nice manner. Internally we call it positive propandanga :)
A big shout out to our team here and especially Julianna, who is our community & social media expert handling NOICE social media accounts. We love having ideas and we like to have fun. One of our internal values is Humour is Good for Business. This is driving us daily. Firstly and quite selfishly because it is funnier for us on a daily basis to find ideas based on an optimistic tone of voice right?
As for how we come up with ideas, I guess it comes from the fact that all the team is truly passionate about our mission to clean up the planet & all the teeth in it. We believe in what we are doing and we see purpose. With this as a basis, ideas kind of come very naturally.
ESGmark®: Did the success of your Crowd funder campaign take you by surprise?
MS: Yes & No :)
There is always a lot of work before the launch of a crowdfunding campaign. It takes months to set up, plan, and prepare. This being said we are very proud of how fast we reached 75% of our funding in only 2 weeks. It is amazing. We convinced over 120 investors up to date to join our vision in creating a world where having a positive impact will be as easy as brushing our teeth. It is amazing! And the opportunity to own a future of sustainable toothpaste is still available. Go go go & join us: https://bit.ly/noiceimpactinvesting
It is very important for the team to open the ownership of NOICE to our friends, clients, followers and to the crowd. Empowering anyone to become an impact investor and take a share in NOICE’s future!
ESGmark®: What are the business plans for 2022?
MS: Do you have an hour in front of you? We have big plans for 2022.
# R&D
We will add more naturally efficient & zero waste oral care essentials to our offer. We are currently working on a toothbrush and also mouthwash. We are also thinking about floss and as I am a new mum I’d really like to develop a kid formula at some point.
# Team hiring
We plan on increasing the team of course with great talents to complete our already talented team.
# Sustainability Excellence
We will continue our effort in monitoring our emissions and putting plans to reduce those emissions. We will continue offsetting the emission that can’t be reduced just yet in order to have a regenerative impact on the climate. Part of our sustainability excellence is also to localise the production of NOICE in each of our markets as well as working on developing 100% home compostable refills.
ESGmark®: Where do you hope to be in 2025?
MS: In every bathroom in the UK! And put an end to the 300 millions toothpaste plastic tubes wasted every year! We have the ambition to be the one stop shop for a natural & zero-waste bathroom.
ESGmark®: What are you reading at the moment?
MS: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind is a book by Yuval Noah Harar
A great read to understand better the different key events of humanity leading to the world we know today. I find this book very interesting and informative but also full of hope that change is just in our hand.
Laid Bare: What the Business Leader Learned From the Stripper from Paulina Tenner. A great read about entrepreneurship, leadership & how to have a transformative approach within a startup. Very inspiring read!
ESGmark®: Who is your biggest inspiration in the world of sustainability and/or business?
MS: Great question. I listen to a lot of podcasts (mostly in French, sorry).
My biggest inspiration in the world of sustainability are documentaries mostly. I would recommend two:
> Before the flood: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbEnOYtsXHA
> The Naked Arctic Adventure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhnzY1jpmjw
For more on NOICE and their mission to take the world of dental care circular, visit their website.
We have so many other great interviews with our members and founders - try KAIA Clothing on COP26, Green Glamour on sustainable fashion or 8 Billion Minds on learning in the 21st century.
