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How Sarah Kauss Built S’well
In a recent episode of NPR’s How I Built This, Sarah Kauss (MBA 2003) discussed the formation of the reusable water bottle company S’well. The key revelation, she notes, came during a hike in 2009 with her mother, who had just been declared cancer-free. “We were celebrating her health and really having those deep conversations, those thoughts about life—you know, you get one and what do you want to do with it?” Kauss tells host Guy Raz. In the midst of a hot day in Tuscon, AZ, Kauss reflected not only on the inability of her water bottle to keep liquids cool, but also on her recent HBS Reunion, where she had listened to Harvard Professor Daniel Schrag discuss the impacts of climate change and the looming global water crisis. “I had this idea … that if there was a company that was creating a better water bottle and you tried to tie it to a social mission by working on plastics and climate change—and educating people about the water crisis—it could be really interesting to do something good while doing something good.”
Kauss also discussed her environmental motivations in this recent Bulletin, noting that just one S’well bottle can replace at least 167 single-use plastic ones per year—enough to put her Million Bottle Project, which aims to eliminate 100 million plastic bottles by 2020, well ahead of schedule. “We’re trying to get our customers to covet this product that will help change their lives in a positive way—and make the world a better place too,” Kauss told the Bulletin.
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