Myro Founder Greg Laptevsky on Sustainable Body Care

Myro is a sustainable bodycare brand. Our first product is a refillable, plant-powered deodorant that does what it should while also reducing plastic waste by 50%. We sold more than $8 million worth of units to date between DTC and retail and are getting ready to aggressively grow over the next 24 months with the introduction of a refillable body wash and a refillable body mist as well as retail footprint expansion.

Prior to launching Myro, I used to work for a meal kit company called Plated where I ran Growth. We used to do a lot of consumer research, including going directly to people’s homes to figure out how to sell them more meal kits. It’s in those research sessions that I heard people say over and over again how they are trying to use better ingredients in their food and reduce packaging along the way. They often pondered why there are “better for you, better for the planet” solutions (ie. meal kits) for the kitchen but not their bathroom (ie. personal care products) or their closet (ie. clothes). When you hear this enough times… a light bulb goes off that maybe there is an enormous unmet need here.

Fast forward a year of targeted research and another year of product development, Myro was born with three key value propositions at its core:

1. Better formulations for you — no toxic anything
2. Better packaging for everyone else — 50%+ plastic reduction
3. “Sexy” breakthrough branding — because deodorant selfies are cool

I scaled a number of direct-to-consumer businesses prior to founding Myro. The most recent one is called Plated, where I joined around seed stage and scaled it through a $300 million acquisition to Albertsons.

I imagine a material turnover of household name brands within the bodycare category driven by sustainability innovations. Most bodycare products we use every day will require some sustainable packaging reimagining — it’s just a matter of time (just think of how much plastic you’re tossing every month). We want to be a thought leader and an innovator in the space.

We have rockstar immediate and extended teams! Our COO made $1 billion worth of products, our Head of Sales scaled CPG from scratch, our Creative Director was a design director for Kate Spade… the list goes on. Most of the core team came together through a friend of a friend of a friend referral, and we’re all focused on a single mission of building Myro into a sustainable body care leader.

We do, but I don’t really think about competition that much. We sell products in super mature categories that have been around for almost a century. We are maniacally focused on delivering on three core values propositions:

1. Better for you formulas
2. Better for everyone else packaging
3. Breakthrough branding

We sell direct-to-consumer through our ecommerce site, mostly subscriptions. We also sell to retail partners through wholesale relationships.

One of Myro’s mission statements is to “Do good sh*t”. This includes access to opportunities that are only otherwise available behind closed doors. I love the idea of crowdfunding because it makes this opportunity access possible.

We intend to use the capital to support new product launches and retail door expansions.

I want them to try and fall in love with the product. We are looking for brand and product ambassadors.

Many, many very large businesses have been built in bodycare space (ie. Native, Drunk Elephant, DollarShaveClub, Cremo, etc), so the total market as well as exit opportunities are plentiful. We have not set specific future goals, but we are certainly excited to build a high-growth business and generate material returns.