After 15 minutes, we started to wonder about our office visitor who asked to use our “bathroom”—a small former darkroom closet installed with a new design of Swedish composting toilet we were trying out.
She finally emerged. “I love that toilet! What does it cost?” It wasn’t really for sale, we told her, but 20 minutes of beseeching us to order one for her ultimately led to Ecovita, my eco-toilet business specializing in urine-diverting composting toilets. That was in 2000 or so.
I had always wanted a products business, since my work as a freelance writer meant I was at the computer for hours every day. Selling big products is way different: Moving around big 40-pound boxes, opening boxes to figure out what was rattling around, re-strapping boxes, talking to customers at our showroom and at conferences got me moving.
At the same time, I was introduced to new forms of stress: Managing bookkeeping, tracking orders, searching for lost packages (never assume FedEx/UPS/DHL/USPS thinks it is responsible for the package they lost), unexpected U.S. Customs charges, and the panic that comes from wiring several thousand dollars overseas.
All in all, it’s been good. Ecovita still exists (don’t look at the website just yet—the new one will appear next week). And here’s what I’ve learned:
- People who buy little urine-diverting toilets are usually cool people. They need composting toilets for their little lakeside cottages, their art studios, their projects in beautiful remote environmentally sensitive places with no sewer or septic service. Many could choose something a little more conventional, but the “dealing with your own poop” thing really sets apart a type of person.
Customers call to ask a question and we end up talking about secret paradises on the Gulf coast or how to install a toilet in a gypsy wagon or how to introduce ecological toilets in cholera-ridden Haiti. Or the link between composting toilets and sweet papayas. Or how to make one. Two Buddhist nuns stopped by to pick up an eco-toilet for their remote mountain retreat. People heading to Haiti, to Central America, call to order a urine diverter to be stashed in their luggage. Here’s one of the latest interesting people to call: Mary Cann of Follow the Honey.
- Telling people you supply recycling composting eco-toilets is a filter. It brings the most curious and systems-thinking folks to you. And passionate environment lovers (“Yes!!! We have to stop using clean water to flush toilets!”) The mere mortals who don’t care for the eco-toilet topic, they’re OK, too, but after listening to 10 minutes of giggly toilet jokes, you start to think about stages of human development and what stage was the poop obsession/avoidance stage? (As a bumper sticker stated: “Excreta recyclers make better lovers.”)
- Some people really identify with a tool that allows them to reconnect directly to the planet’s nutrient cycle. One woman who bought an eco-toilet for her tiny house she parked next to her daughter’s house even wrote a poem.
- Supplying something useful and nonpolluting occasionally gets you gigs in beautiful places. I’ve presented on this topic to audiences in Fiji, Mexico, Hawaii, and Samoa. I should say this was due to work by my coauthor, David Del Porto and his work with Greenpeace Pacific. (Before Ecovita, there was our book, The Composting Toilet System Book. It was his office where we had the toilet-in-a-darkroom bathroom.) Some of these presentations and projects were paid, some were subsidized, some were labors of love and our own money.
And there have been more practical, hard-won (read: expensive) lessons:
5. With a products business, you learn to do quick business calculations. Like, you figure out what your baseline overhead is. You’ll soon quickly calculate other folks’ business profitability. (Ex.: Why is she selling those scarves for $70 each? Cost of event + cost of value added + cost of taking credit cards, etc.) And: Don’t buy too many experimental products that you’re paying to store but not really selling.
6. Sometimes a business is not about the cash profit but about the connections and other value you get from it. Ask anyone who publishes their own books. Is it about profitability? Often it’s about the people you meet, the places you go, the conversations you have. That said, remember #5 and do a regular cost-benefit check-in on anything you’re doing.
7. If you represent a product, decide if you need an exclusive contract. If not, keep expectations low. Beware of making the business look too profitable. Someone swooped in and took over importing one line of toilet I supplied for years. I created the market for them in North America. He convinced the manufacturer he’d do better. Then he raised the price a lot. And then he found what I warned them: the business doesn’t support several people. So now he has reduced prices and discouraged resellers. No matter. My cost-benefit analysis told me it wasn’t worth it for me to get an exclusive and invest in scaling up the business.
A few more lessons:
Some folks will ask a lot of questions to simply look for reasons not to get something. “How much would it cost to ship that to Saskatoon?” If they don’t ask a lot of other questions about the product, I know they’re not serious. And then there are the architecture interns and students who want you to write several pages of their papers on the topic of ecological sanitation. Just say no.
You’ll also learn how expensive it is to make a product. You want to make your own plastic product so you can stop importing it from overseas? The molds alone can cost many thousands. Next, you’ll have to invest in making a minimum order of 2,000 pieces. And that’s why companies, such as Ecovita, still import many items, alas.
So a business is truly a learning experience. I’d say Ecovita is the equivalent of one third of an MBA in experience and lessons learned. And 100% karma for relationships made, nutrients recycled, and water conserved.
*That was the short story of Ecovita. EcoTech wanted to bring in the toilets, but one of its existing lines, Sun-Mar, threatened to pull its supply. So Dave said, “why don’t you import them yourself?”
