The year 2024 is drawing to a close, and it’s time to look back at the months that have passed. A year filled with both challenges and successes, with joy and reflection. As we now summarize the past year, it’s a chance to reflect on everything that has happened – big moments, small victories, and unexpected turns that have shaped us. Let’s take a step back, gather our memories, and give ourselves a moment of quiet contemplation, before moving on to new adventures and opportunities.
January is a month for us when reporting is due, inventories are taken, compiled, and submitted. Not the world’s most creative work, but important. Perhaps you’ve seen the little symbol with “spinning arrows” indicating that the product has been reported and paid for – industry producer responsibility, the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency. It’s an important thing to take care of in January, among other things. In addition, we also managed both beach cleaning and reforestation together with fine friends who work for the environment and climate in a different way than the work we do here in Vilhelmina.
In February, the snow lies deep, and the thermometer can still show down to -30 and even -40 in Vilhelmina, while in southern Sweden, people start thinking about soaping their decking. Said and done, time to start preparing for the decking season. Here, we also started looking for more employees, and in March, several new people came in and started working in both packaging and the factory. But here also came a new product from us, namely window cleaner. Windows need something other than soap, and our lab has been working on solving this, and just in time for the spring thaw, the window cleaner was launched. Never could we have imagined how well it would be received. Dear you, it has been so much fun to make window cleaner, and how much window cleaner we have made. We have made over 52,000 bottles since the start of the spring thaw in Vilhelmina.
In March, the decking season is in full swing, and then there’s no time for anything other than working hard, and we got even more people in packaging. After that, we wished Happy Easter with an Easter cloth and continued sending out decking soap to Sweden. But it wasn’t just decking soap, even if it might have looked like it, we were working hard on the laundry detergent. All-purpose detergent with a citrus scent and, of course, a fragrance-free version were prepared and tested over and over again on new stains. We have tested everything from eggs and chili mayonnaise to paprika, ketchup, and blueberries. In May, we produced laundry detergent in full swing, to actually start selling it in June. It was a nervous weekend after school graduation when the laundry detergent was to be released.
In the factory, we celebrated with cake when the laundry detergent was ready, but we were far from actually knowing if our customers would like it and want to buy it.
We had promised the children that the whole family would take a beginner’s course in golf, and we did. We went to Åsele and their fine golf club where a beginner’s course was held in drizzle and a few plus degrees; between the sessions, there were hot dogs and coffee, AND we nervously checked how the launch of the laundry detergent was going. It went far beyond expectations, and at the time of writing, we have sold just over 100,000 bottles of laundry detergent. I cannot thank you all enough for the wonderful reception of the product, thank you to everyone who bought the laundry detergent. A year and a half of work turned into a very successful launch.
Then came the long-awaited summer, which also failed a bit. There was never any real swimming weather here, and no nice summer, just rain and more rain, which actually made it quite okay to work, and that suited us well because we expanded the packaging even more, expanded the warehouse, got some new machines, and started planning for yet another launch, while the first Christmas soaps were bottled on the last day of August.
Descaling was our next product. Limescale in bathrooms and on shower doors is among the most common cleaning questions we have received over the years, and as you know, something acidic is needed to get rid of limescale deposits. It’s not an easy nut to crack, and sure, you can be tempted to use a stronger chemical to get the shower wall shiny again, but – no, we won’t go there! After the lab did its job, i.e., tested and tested some more, we had a solution to present in the fall. This product has also been well received by you, our dear customers. We have managed to make 15,000 bottles, and from what we understand, you think it works, even though it’s not strong.
How do we develop new products? Well, it works so that we start from the problem, what do our customers need to solve, and how can it be done without using harmful chemicals, without putting more strain on the climate and environment than absolutely necessary, and then you need to ensure that it cannot harm the user. That’s where we start! Things like production and price don’t come first, and sure, it’s a bit harder to work that way, but well worth it anyway.
We don’t have a big chemical factory to use, but we need to build every solution, every machine, and every recipe from scratch. We have to do everything ourselves from the start.
And then came this year’s VIP day and sale. We only have a sale once a year, and then, of course, things get a little hectic. The packaging was in the starting blocks, and you know what, the packaging halved the delivery time from the previous year. It’s otherwise a challenge when so much has to happen at the same time. We also do this part ourselves; it’s not so common to develop, produce, package, and ship from the same place, but that’s how it works here. If you’ve had to wait for your package, we apologize, but your package has been packed and shipped by people in Vilhelmina, not a robot and not a third-party warehouse, we hope that’s worth something too.
Now, there are actually more news coming, and one of them I can reveal now, it’s our seasonal fragrance subscription. It’s something that our customers have actually requested, and it will be launched at the beginning of next year. You can already go to the website to read more about it.
In the lab, four new products are now being tested for 2025.
Have we learned anything in 2024? Yes, we have learned that together we can do more than we think, that age is just a number, that the EPA teenagers and the pensioners who work extra have become good friends is a clear example. We have learned that everything starts with an idea, and with the right help and advice, it can be made into a real product. We have also learned that sunshine in the mind, to support, help, and encourage, is what gives the results. Perhaps there is a little heritage from the time with skiing here? I don’t know, but I would like to think so! A pat on the shoulder, a slap on the back, a post-it note with a nice message, that’s what separates a winning team from a losing team. In 2024, we won each other, a group with very different conditions, not even the same language, but with the same goal – to recycle more, to deliver chemical-wise cleaning products from Vilhelmina to the rest of the country.