one year, one canadian

Sapadilla makes “nice little eco-cleaners” from their headquarters in Burnaby, BC. Co-founder Jill Goodbrand (how could you not be an entrepreneur with a name like that?) kindly agreed to answer my questions via email. If you read the whole interview, you too can learn terms like surfactants and saponify.

She also sent me a bunch of their products to check out. I haven’t cracked them open yet, but I’ll report back on what I think.

1Y1C: A couple of my friends actually recommend Sapadilla to me. Tell me a little about why you started the company.

Jill: I was working as a copywriter for big ad agencies, and Steve, who holds a Masters of Environmental Science, was working in his field – but in stuffy offices. We both wanted to do our own thing, partly because we’ve got entrepreneurial genes and partly because both of us felt frustrated about being a small piece of a big puzzle. We wanted to create a company that allowed us to be involved in things full circle. And, of course, it had to be something we felt good about bringing into the world.

Several years ago, we took a look at the cleaning category, and found it lacking. Natural cleaners have been around for quite a while, but we felt there was nothing to love. No companies producing the type of high quality product you might get excited about, the way you can about some products in other categories, like fine foods or bath and body. And so, we set about researching and developing our line, aiming to create high quality natural cleaning products that were enjoyable to use. We stuck to three key factors: essential oil aromas, package design and earth-friendly formulations.

1Y1C: When you hear from customers, what do they like about your products?

We actually receive regular emails from enthusiastic customers telling us how much they love our products, which is definitely very rewarding. What we hear the most is how much they love our aromas. People are generally exposed to synthetic fragrance, so it’s a very refreshing change to use only pure and natural essential oils. Next to that, customers get excited that we’re local.

1Y1C: How do you differentiate your cleaners from other natural cleaners on the market?

Again, it’s all about the essential oil aromas. We worked with a natural perfumist to create our blends, so they smell wonderfully fresh and natural. We use these oils at high concentrations, making our products more special and high-end.

1Y1C: Are any of your products entirely sourced in Canada? That is, do all of the ingredients come from Canada? If not, what are the barriers to sourcing Canadian ingredients. I’d imagine price would be the major one, but can you simply not get some ingredients in Canada?

No, not entirely sourced in Canada and here’s why. Cleaning products are made with ingredients called surfactants. Some good, some bad, some really bad. Conventional cleaning products use petroleum-based surfactants (among other nasties), while most natural cleaning products use plant-derived ones. Of the plant-based surfactants we use, one is made in Canada (Cocamidopropyl Betaine), but our main cleaning ingredients are from the Alkyl Polyglucoside family and, as far as we know, these are not manufactured in Canada.

We use this ingredient because it is has a far superior environmental and health profile to other plant-based surfactants that are available in Canada (like Sodium Lauryl Sulfate and Sodium Lauryl Ether Sulfate). We get our plant-derived APG’s from a manufacturer in the US, but they can also come from Europe or Asia. We purchase all our ingredients through Canadian suppliers, but they come from all over: Canada, the US, Europe and other areas. That said, all the manufacturing of our products is done here, so they are made in Canada as far as NAFTA is concerned.

To clean your home with ingredients 100% grown in Canada would be very difficult. I’m not sure if any basics like vinegar or baking soda are manufactured anywhere here, but you could look into that. Probably safe to assume lemons are out!  Plus, you’d need some sort of soap for dishes, laundry, etc. and, actually, you’d have a tough time making basic soap entirely sourced here too.

You could find corn, hemp or soy oil (or animal tallow), but unless you can find a Canadian manufacturer of lye (sodium hydroxide), which is required to saponify the oils (that is turn them into soap), you’d be out of luck. You could get really extreme, I suppose, and made your own wood ash lye, but I don’t imagine too many people are up for that!

The issue isn’t really cost, it’s the availability of one of our major ingredients. It would be wonderful for us if all ingredients were made in Canada.

Note: Jill heard back from more of her suppliers so the above answer was amended slightly on March 11, 2011. It now reflects the fact that you can find one surfactant that’s manufactured in Canada. Previously it indicated that no surfactants were made in Canada.