570: Your Toothbrush is GROSS - They Fixed it and Made MILLIONS | SURI

The Foundr Podcast with Nathan Chan

Nathan Chan

Marketing, Business, Entrepreneurship

4.8 • 662 Ratings

🗓️ 27 June 2025

⏱️ 60 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In this episode, Mark Rushmore and Gyve Safavi, co-founders of SURI (Sustainable Rituals), share how they turned a simple personal care item into a sustainable, design-led movement—challenging legacy players like Oral-B and Philips. They share: • Why the electric toothbrush was overdue for disruption • The intentional product and packaging design that drove early virality • Their approach to building a mission-led brand without greenwashing • How they scaled operations and manufacturing for a regulated hardware product • The mindset shifts needed to build a physical product business with lean resources • How their background in finance and tech shaped their founder journey If you're building a physical product or a brand that stands for something bigger, this conversation is packed with practical advice and inspiration. Foundr Community Offers Want 1-on-1 mentorship to launch or scale your brand faster? Apply for eCommerce coaching: → Starting your ecom biz? ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ → Already selling and want to scale? ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ Want all-access to step-by-step training from 7, 8 & 9-figure founders? Start your Foundr+ $1 trial today → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ Omnisend | Get 50% off your first 3 months of email and SMS marketing with Omnisend with the code FOUNDR50. ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ to get started. Connect With Nathan Chan Instagram → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click Here⁠⁠⁠⁠ LinkedIn → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click Here⁠⁠⁠⁠ Connect With SURI Website → ⁠https://trysuri.com⁠ Instagram → ⁠https://www.instagram.com/discoversuri⁠ Follow Foundr for More Business Growth Strategies YouTube → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ Website → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ Instagram → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ Facebook → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ Twitter → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ LinkedIn → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here⁠⁠⁠⁠ Podcast → ⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey Founder Fam, I want to talk to you about something super exciting. We're officially partnered with Omniscend, the email marketing and SMS platform built specifically for e-commerce founders. We've been recommending Omnysend to Founders students for a while now because it just works. Whether you're launching your first store or you're scaling the seven figures, it really helps you automate your marketing and get real results.
0:24.0	Did you know on average, Omnysend customers make $68 for every $1 they spend, which is an insanely good return on investment?
0:32.6	And because you're part of the founder community, you get 50% off your first three months with the code Founder 50.
0:39.3	Just head to Omnicend.com forward slash founder without the E to get started.
0:45.1	All right.
0:45.9	Now let's jump back into the show.
0:48.7	When people try the product, they don't like it.
0:51.7	They love it.
0:52.6	The way they describe it, the way it's changed their life, it sounds kind of crazy.
0:56.8	But those people then become such advocates.
0:59.1	They're telling their friends, their family.
1:01.0	And then those people also love it.
1:02.9	And you can see then how it kind of grows.
1:04.9	You want to know why Surrey has grown so quickly.
1:07.5	Go and read those reviews.
1:08.7	They're the co-founders of Surrey, who turned an everyday
1:11.2	habit into over a $40 million brand, from 5,000 pre-orders to 10,000 glowing reviews. Here's how
1:17.4	they built the world's most loved electric toothbrush. We actually had this pretty big disaster
1:22.0	that felt existential in our very first week of shipping. We had a call from our 3PL one day saying,
1:27.1	oh, we haven't actually shipped any of the products.
1:29.0	There's been a problem with the labeling.
1:30.7	And it just felt in that moment the world was falling around us.
	...

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