Shampoo With A Purpose is a wonderful Australian company; they make their shampoo bars in Penrith, NSW. They are vegan, cruelty-free, palm oil-free, sulfate free, eco-sustainable and packaged with no plastic!
Founded by mother and daughter team, Liz and Geneva Valek in 2018, Shampoo With A Purpose is not just environmentally friendly, but also a gorgeous product to use.
Sandi Sieger chats to Geneva Valek about the solid shampoo bars and what it’s really like to run a business.
Tell us about Shampoo With A Purpose. What makes this brand so unique?
Shampoo With A Purpose is our range of solid haircare that falls under the branch of my family business, Clover Fields. Clover Fields is Australia’s oldest family-owned soap maker, and I am lucky enough to play a wonderful part in our little family unit. We launched in 2018 with a view to creating a cheaper and improved alternative to the other shampoo bars on the market at the time and since then we’ve been on the up and up! Our brand is unique because of the love, care and effort put into making our products without affecting their affordability. Our number one point of difference is that one of our bars is worth up to SIX bottles of shampoo and conditioner and at $15 that’s an excellent deal.
What inspired you to start Shampoo With A Purpose?
In our 37 years of establishment, we have strived to be at the forefront of natural products and in recent years the need plastic-free has become more and more of a priority for us and our customers. We wanted to hack what the shampoo bar was at the time. After two years of development, we finally released our combo bar, that lasts for ages and won’t turn to mush in the shower! We really want to see a reduction of our impact on the environment, personally and as a business so we are incredibly proud of the work our brand is doing.
How does the solid shampoo bar work?
The best part is how easy it is to use – wet your hair then run the bar through with your hands, you’ll have foamy hair in no time. Leave it in for a few minutes to get the full effect of the conditioner then rinse. It’s that simple – it reduces time, money, effort and your impact on the environment!
Each solid shampoo bar in the range is tailored for specific hair types/concerns. How do you determine what natural ingredient is beneficial to that specific formulation?
A lot of development work and testing went into the production of our bars, along with chemists and formulators working with us on the efficacy of certain extracts and oils for certain hair types. At the moment we have a general bar called the OG, Dry or Damaged, Volume and Colour Treated but keep an eye out for our new Oil-Control and Curly Girl bars!
What other uses do the Shampoo With A Purpose bars have?
You can use them as overall body bars so you only have to use one product in the shower! It can also double as a shave bar with a little foaming on the area you want to shave.
We love brands that are vegan and cruelty-free. Why was it so important for Shampoo With A Purpose not to use any animal by-products?
We believe that animal by-products are simply not necessary in skin and hair care. We were one of the first companies in Australia to put a stop to using animal-fat-based soaps and have always had a focus on cruelty-free products. It’s important to us as these things are simply part of our core ethics as a business.
Tell us about your career and background. Did this play a role in the launch of Shampoo With A Purpose?
I have had an interesting career to put it shortly. My mother Liz is an absolute powerhouse of a woman and she founded the business in 1983. As a woman and leader in business, she has overcome incredible hurdles and is one of the strongest people I know.
We had a difficult family life toward the end of my high-school years and my parents divorced when I was in year 11. After enduring a difficult period of emotional abuse from my father, my mother and I had to rebuild our lives and Clover Fields from the ground up. We’ve both been through so much together and we really had to rework our personal relationship – as everyone knows, periods of family turbulence can break down even the strongest bonds – particularly when you are working to heal trauma.
After leaving in Year 11 I started a career in the music industry, I was a venue booker for the Enmore, Factory and Metro Theatres in Sydney, The Comedy Store, Sydney Comedy Festival and others, this was an incredible position to be in at just 17, and was definitely the basis for a lot of my business and negotiation skills but also gave me some clear boundaries for my core ethics and personal beliefs. I then came to work with the family business after my Mum suffered a difficult injury and quickly fell in love with the world which I had already known for my whole life.
Coming into Clover Fields three years ago was the perfect move – Mum and I had come closer having with come to terms with what we had both been through, which truly built the foundation for a collaborative and creative working relationship unlike any other I’ve ever had. The level of honesty, openness and fun that we have developing products and changing our business has lead to some of the best moments in our business’ history and personally I feel really lucky to have been able to have this experience within my life.
Describe a typical workday for you?
There is no such thing as a typical day when you work in a small-medium business! I’m in around 9am with my dog Oli who hangs out with his friends George and Didi in our front yard all day. I will then answer a metric tonne of emails, and work in with our team to make sure our wholesale and retail team are on top of everything. We have morning tea at 11am, everyone has their tea or coffee made ready for them. Then we have lunch and an afternoon tea which are also delightful. I’ll generally have a number of walk-throughs with clients of our facilities during the week as well as with our suppliers and others. At this point in the year, I’m working on a number of product development projects for later in the year so that’s also about half of my day. I head home to Parramatta from Penrith at 5.30pm and I try to switch off my work notifications and relax. Though that is sometimes easier said than done. It’s fantastic to work in an organisation that doesn’t enforce overtime or require my 24-hour availability – my personal mental and physical wellbeing has never been better.
What advice do you have for those wanting to start a business?
In my case it’s easy – have a parent that has an existing business and work with them – ahaha! I have, however, successfully run my own personal exploits, and to those wanting to start a business or new project, I’d recommend assessing your necessity before moving forward. Are you looking to launch a business with crystals in water bottles? So is every other person in the world, what makes you and your product special? Entrepreneurs who rely on products that are already established and expect that people will choose theirs out of a sea of many, without defining their difference, are setting them up to fail. In our case, we have made something natural, eco-friendly and plastic-free, but there were already a couple of businesses doing that – so we worked really hard to make our product half the price, last for four times as long and better quality. Being a cut above the rest will lead you to success.
What’s next for you, and Shampoo With A Purpose in 2020?
We have some product development in the pipeline as I have hinted at before! We are also exhibiting overseas at Natural and Organic Europe and Cosmoprof Las Vegas to help increase our business’ export market. These products are special worldwide and the response so far has been incredible – we are scaling up and expanding which is an incredible and exciting thing for a business that has already been established for 37 years.