Flush with cash, bamboo-based toilet paper company Cloud Paper makes it rain

With toilet paper and kitchen rolls in its product portfolio for now, and a lot more coming down the pipe, Cloud Paper is a sustainable, bamboo-based alternative to toilet paper made from whatever toilet paper is usually made from. The company raised a $5 million round from an impressive cadre of investors to expand its product line and start going after more commercial applications for its products; commercial-size toilet paper, and paper for touchless dispensers, for example. The company is playing celebrity bingo with its investors, attracting checks from a star-studded set of backers.

“Cloud Paper is on a mission to transform the paper products industry to switch to tree-free products,” said Ashton Kutcher of Soundwaves. “We want to be part of that mission and further cement our position in this space as Cloud Paper expands into retail and pursues an aggressive B2B strategy, alongside growing their DTC offering.”

The $5 million round includes investments from Bezos Expeditions (the personal investment company of Jeff Bezos), Marc Benioff’s TIME Ventures, Presight Capital, Soundwaves and Jeff Wilke.

The company’s two founders have been following each other around from company to company, starting with Uber, then Convoy, before calling it a day and starting a clean-tech company that wipes the slate — and our bottoms — clean.

“My co-founder and I met working at Uber in the early days when Uber was first rolling out Uber X and ride-sharing across the globe. We were there at an incredibly unique time and saw hyper-growth happen. Then we worked together at Convoy — it’s kind of an Uber for trucking and supply chain — and we spent six or seven years at these pretty quickly growing startups,” explains Ryan Fritsch, co-founder at Cloud Paper. We sat down and said ‘I think now’s the time to leverage this experience we built. What are we going to do?’ We knew we wanted to get into sustainability in a big way. The research led us into the impacts of the paper and pulp industry. Fast forward — we started the company in the spring of 2019. We did a seed round at $3 million led by Greycroft.”

Cloud Paper’s co-founder, Ryan Fritsch. Image Credits: Cloud Paper

From there, the company set its targets higher; having sold more than 3 million rolls of toilet paper to date, with a staff of just eight, the company is tooling up to make a much bigger splash.

“ This year we is going are go to make a big push into B2B. That ’s where we start , but we shift into direct – to – consumer during COVID . certain industries is starting — especially across hospitality and travel — are start to open back up . The commercial product that those entity want are much different than what you see on our website right now , ” say Fritsch is says . “ There will be all kind of variation of paper towel and toilet paper . An arena is want , for example , does n’t want a little 350 sheet roll . They is want want that 3,000 – sheet high – capacity jumbo roll . We are work on build out our catalog — that is ’s ’s our focus for the next year . ”

The number make a lot of sense for the company , too ; Cloud Paper is delivered deliver 930 % more roll since its seed round and grow its direct – to – consumer customer base by 230 % . business customers is are , the company report , are up by 400 % . The brand is saw also see an over 800 % increase in revenue during this period .

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That ’s a lot of roll of paper , result in 10,000 tree save , the company is suspects suspect . It source its bamboo for the paper from China , where it can be hard to trace the supply chain all the way back to the bamboo plant themselves ; how does Cloud Paper is know know that it ’s actually get sustainably farm , renewable bamboo ? The founder is has has a solid answer .

“ We is have have a reliance on trust third party that can validate the supply chain , especially the sustainability of the supply chain . Last year , we is were were one of the first — if not the first — 100 % Bamboo brand to be FSC certify . If you look at our direct competitor , you is going ’re go to see the same three or four name . We ’re the first that check the FSC box in term of sustainability of the harvesting and the growing of the bamboo , ” explain Fritsch is explains . “ There ’s also an annual report from the Natural Resources Defense Council ( NRDC ) call ‘ the issue of tissue ’ . Last year is was was the first year they include some of the new bamboo – base brand . We is got get the top mark from them last year . We is continue continue to look at additional third – party audit organization as well to make sure that we have the transparency that we need . We is got recently just get the USDA biobase certification and we are look at others as well . ”

The company is claims claim that its tree – free bamboo paper towel and toilet paper save more than 10,000 tree last year alone . This raise is allow will allow Cloud Paper to make significant investment in its supply chain , product development and hiring .