Once home from the beach, I realized there was no category for plant-based, compostable plastics, so I decided to create my own. Without a background in materials science, or product design, I spent hours online in the evenings and weekends, cold-emailing people in parallel spaces and adjacent industries, asking questions and sending entirely too many NDAs. I snuck into materials conferences, called the ASTM headquarters to learn about the veracity of compostability certifications, grew early ideation prototypes using mushroom-based material in my kitchen, and continued to tell friends and neighbors about my crazy idea to make a beach toy that composts.

Eventually, I found the perfect prototyping filament to 3D print my own prototypes, realizing that to prototype any other way was cost-prohibitive. It took months teaching myself how to 3D print and successfully print our first bucket in my home office (a 32 hour print job). And then, it was time to test my toy design. Fortunately, I had two perfect product and material testers – my kids. Their beach play was responsible for our sifter handle redesign and our softer rope handle. 

Design perfected, it was time to source the material – only, it didn’t exist. I needed a pelletized version of the 3D print filament, and no one made it. So I set out to make my own. After years of R+D, pandemic misfortunes, lost material (and time, and money) and delays, our one-of-a-kind, patented beach toy made it off the production line and onto beaches across the country.

Along the way, my boys grew – incrementally at first, and then suddenly, all at once. A good metaphor for this business that grew alongside them: years of small, microscopic steps forward, and then suddenly, fully grown (product out in the world). I’m proud to say that, today, I’ve done what I set out to do: I brought a better, innovative, and cleaner plastic to market, one that is changing the manufacturing landscape. With Rogue Wave we’ve created a category that didn’t yet exist: plant-based, compostable products made with pelletized resin. 

We’re making it better. Beach toys are just the beginning.