10
Q4 • 2022
BRANDS WE LOVE E
Brands We Love
Who knew that bathroom humor could pay such dividends and do so much good?
t
urns out, three guys who love toilet paper did. When Simon Griffiths, Jehan
Ratnatunga, and Danny Alexander learned that more than 2.4 billion people—roughly 40 percent of the world population—didn’t have access to a toilet, they wanted to do something about it, so they started a toilet paper brand called Who Gives a Crap. You might say they “gave a crap” about people who were “up a creek” and needed some help. The three TP lovers launched their
company in July of 2012 with a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo. The company’s website (
whogivesacrap.org) features the original video of Griffiths, the CEO, sitting on a toilet in the middle of the company warehouse, stumping for donations. He sat on the throne for 50 hours because that’s how long it took to raise the $50,000 they needed to stock the warehouse. Less than nine months later, they were shipping their first rolls. Who Gives a Crap is summed up succinctly in its social media bios (with help from creative emoji usage): “Good for your bum; Great for the world; 100% bamboo & recycled TP; 50%
of profits donated to help build toilets.” On
whogivesacrap.org, the company describes itself as a toilet paper company that builds toilets. The company’s main products are two
types of toilet paper: the first is 100 percent recycled toilet paper, and the second is their more premium 100 percent bamboo toilet paper, which is slightly more expensive. The company also sells forest-friendly paper towels and tissues. All products come with a 100 percent guarantee, meaning you can send them back for a full refund if you aren’t satisfied. Most of Who Gives a Crap’s business is done via direct-to-consumer shipping in Australia, the United States, and the United Kingdom, but the products are also available at wholesale locations in those countries and at select grocery stores. The official mission of Who Gives a
Crap is to ensure that everyone has access to clean water and a toilet in the lifetime of its founders. Today, the number of people without access to sanitation facilities is at two billion. Contaminated water contributes to more than one million deaths globally per
year. To fight this problem, Who Gives a Crap uses 50 percent of their profits to build toilets and improve sanitation in the developing world. How is
the business of “giving a crap” going? To date, the company says
it has donated 10.8 million Aussie dollars to the following organizations: Splash, Water & Sanitation for the Urban Poor, Water for People, WaterAid, Sanergy, Lwala Community Alliance, Shining Hope for Communities (SHOFCO), and International Developmental Enterprises (iDE). All those organizations are involved in delivering clean water and sanitation to people in developing countries. As the demand for Who Gives a Crap TP
has grown, so have the donations. In their first year, the company made enough money to donate a modest $2,500. In 2021, that number
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