Ryan Fritsch co-founded the US company Cloud Paper, the 100% bamboo and plastic-free paper brand, in the spring of 2019. Here, he discusses the long-term, personal tissue choices which led to his start-up in the industry
I’ve always appreciated the higher quality and sustainable tissue products. The problem was for a long time it was impossible to find high-quality, soft, tissue on the market.
This is why I am a vocal advocate for bamboo tissue products – it is far more sustainable than traditional paper products, without sacrificing softness or quality.
Traditionally, sustainable tissue products meant using recycled fibre. Unfortunately, the quality of recycled tissue is subpar for a lot of people so we haven’t seen the mass adoption we would hope for. So we set out to launch a line of tissue products that were both sustainable and high quality and landed on 100% bamboo as the core input to our products.
Historically, tissue products were part of my weekly supermarket routine, but my shopping habits have changed dramatically over the last several years with the rise of convenient, direct-to-consumer brands. Now, with automatic deliveries to my doorstep, I never have to think about buying tissue products.
Over the last several years I’ve exclusively used environmentally-friendly tissue and towel products. Price, quality, and convenience are all important to me as it is to most people.
This is why at Cloud Paper, we’ve been incredibly focused on providing the most price competitive and highest quality 100% bamboo products on the market. We’ve also built out a fulfilment system to make getting Cloud Paper as convenient and as easy as possible.
We have developed premium 3-ply and 2-ply 100% bamboo toilet paper and 100% bamboo paper towels, as well as our first ever reusable product, the Swish Cloth. Cloud Paper is an omni-channel product, which means I can use it and order it at home, as well as find it in other locations in the local Seattle community (with more coming soon!) or in cities throughout the United States via our Gopuff partnership.
The Covid-19 outbreak was definitely a unique period for companies like ours in the tissue and towel space. We saw a significant amount of people start to buy these products in bulk and do so online for the very first time.
The vast majority of people have previously never used an e-commerce site for this type of product. However, given the supply constraints in 2020, many people turned to this channel and now enjoy the convenience of ordering online, direct to their door.
Cloud Paper is on a mission to end the global deforestation from paper products. We provide a more sustainable alternative to toilet paper and paper towels with its line of 100% bamboo products, and a new line of reusable Swish Cloths, all in plastic-free packaging, and through carbon-neutral deliveries.
Deforestation is a major driver of climate change and we currently lose an acre of forest land every second around the globe. Cloud Paper is resetting the status quo by moving away from tree-based paper and using ultra-sustainable and renewable resources like bamboo instead.
Going forward, we want to prove to American consumers that you can switch to a sustainable tissue product without sacrificing quality, softness, affordability, or convenience.
