Worcester Business Journal

Q & A SHOP TALK This interview was conducted and edited for length and clarity by Brad Kane, WBJ editor. L ast year, Alli DiVincenzo and her partners founded One Fun Company, planning to turn their Splatz hand soap into a fun way for children to wash their hands. With strong sales out of the gate, the startup has high ambitions for taking the concept to other realms of personal hygiene. How did Splatz come about? I am a graphics designer by trade, so prior to working for One Fun Company, I was doing that work. Around 2010, I had an idea for a technology-inspired toy, a physical toy with an app. I licensed it, and I brought it to market. I had another idea at the time. I wanted to create a hand soap bubble. With my son at the time, I really struggled with getting him to wash his hands. Most parents can relate to this, as he loved to play with slime and other textures, but he hated washing his hands. I wanted to come up with a fun way for him to wash his hands. I don't have any background in chemistry at all, so I worked my Rolodex and eventually connected with Jeff Karp and Yuhan Lee, two scientists associated with Harvard University and MIT. In our spare time – because we had full-time jobs besides – we tinkered around with a formula for a product, which eventually became Splatz. When did you launch? In January of 2020, we had a shelf- stable prototype. We had about 100 kits we were ready to beta test with parents and kids. en the pandemic hit, and everything just stopped. Everyone stopped meeting with people and accepting new products. Luckly, aer a short period, people started accepting toilet paper and personal hygiene products, which included our product. at initial beta release got a ton of good reviews. We filed for our provisional patent in spring 2020. What did you do after the beta test? We knew we had something special, and at the time, we were making the Splatz by hand, which was a very labor- intensive process. We knew we had to scale. We hired our first employee, Bryce Cushing, who had just graduated from the University of Delaware and had studied engineering and business administration. We then created the One Fun Lab, hired two more full-time people, and began to research how to make Splatz using a machine. We now have a machine to produce the product. Before, when we were making them by hand, we could produce 50-100 Splatz per day. Now, we can make up to 1,000 units per day by machine. What is Splatz, exactly? It is a disposable little ball full of soap. Kids describe it as very satisfying. ey can play with it for a second before squishing it together to get the amount of soap they need. It comes in a variety of colors and scents. We've done a ton of testing with our target customers to see what they like best. Turquoise Sky is the most popular, and it comes with a sea breeze citrus scent. We also have Magenta Rose and Green Apple. We do seasonal colors, too; for Halloween, we had a run of black. For Christmas, we have a Rudolph Red, which smells like the holidays. Where does it sell? About 85% of our business is direct to consumer, through our website. We are on Amazon and in more than 100 specialty brick-and-mortar stores all over the country. Another e-tailer, Uncommon Goods, buys them wholesale and sells them on their website. We advertise on Facebook and Instagram. Our product is really great for the visuals of Instagram. Organically, we've gone viral on TikTok, with more than 5 million total views on two separate videos our customers made themselves. We've had some incredible press, too. We were on the "Today Show." We were in Parents magazine and Real Simple magazine. KTLA 5 in Los Angeles did an interview with us. What are your goals for the business? I'd really like to create a new health and beauty category for personal hygiene. Or maybe disrupt the category with a new fun factor. We have a high-level objective to help parents and children with personal care. All the things you can think of kids don't like doing – washing hair, brushing teeth, washing hands – we want to change their habits. During a survey we conducted of people who used Splatz, 80% of parents said they no longer had to ask their kids to wash their hands. We surveyed our customers as to what products they would like to see next. We will likely come out with a bubble bath product next. is past year, we exceeded our Splatz sales expectations by 3x. Next, we are looking to expand our manufacturing capability by 2x, and hire one to two more full-time people. We want to grow from there. Maybe in 2023, we can be 10x from where we are today. It is starting to take off with word- of-mouth and the passionate, loyal customer base. Disrupting hygiene Alli DiVincenzo, Co-founder & CEO One Fun Company, Inc., in Southborough W Year founded: 2020 Employees: 4 full-time DiVincenzo's age: 43 Residence: Westport, Conn. Birthplace: Los Angeles Education: Bachelor's degree in architecture, from the University of Colorado 22 Worcester Business Journal | December 6, 2021 | wbjournal.com Photo | Courtesy of one fun ComPany Alli DiVincenzo with her two children, Capri and Will

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