Hey, this is Young Genius: the newsletter that interviews young, high-signal founders before they’re $100M+ CEOs rolling their eyes at your LinkedIn invite.

What’s high signal? Glad you asked. It’s one, if not all 3, of these:

• 💸 raised smart VC / angel $$

• 🤝 landed multiple Fortune 500 clients

• 🔎 recruited a high-profile advisory board

The other code of conduct Young Genius lives by is MGS. We stole it from our friends at Arc'teryx. You know, the brand that made that $900 jacket your daughter loves. Anyways, MGS stands for “make good shit”.

And in a news world where 99% of newsletters suck. Our mission is to write emails so value-packed that it validates a dream meeting for you.

Well, thank you, Manjit. You’re making us blush.

But seriously. If you’re receiving this newsletter, it’s likely because our LOI team thinks you’d like to be introduced to:

• 🚀 talented next-gen founders

• 🤝 you can invest in, partner or connect with

• 📈 when they’re at pivotable times of their scale-up journey

If you wanna subscribe so you don’t miss the next one, click here 🔒

Now, let’s get to the ground rules.

The Young Genius newsletter works like this. All you gotta do is:

• 1) Read the founder story and

• 2) Hit “request intro” at the end if you’re curious to chat more

Then we send a list of intro requests to the founder.

Sound like your cup of tea? Great. It’s time to meet our guests for the day.

⚡️ Meet Jason and Anastasia, the Tech Sustainability Cofounders Who Have Raised $1.5M+ to Scale Reusables

Jason and Anastasia are building Reusables.com, a circular packaging platform revolutionizing the way food businesses tackle single-use packaging waste.

🎉 Q: 3 Fun Facts you can’t learn from their LinkedIn?

• 🇷🇺 Anastasia used to be on the Russian National Alpine Ski Team and attended boarding school in Switzerland.

• 🏒 Meanwhile, Jason's been a Cross-Triathlon Team Canada member and most famously holds the record for most penalty minutes in a Junior hockey league

• ⛵️ Jason’s also sailed over 1000 offshore nautical miles.

Talk about 2 dream Canadian founders to fund, eh? 🇨🇦

Q: 🥁 What got them into this startup niche?

They’re driven by the alarming forecast that oceans will contain more plastic than fish by 2050 [BBC]. 🗑🐟

Their passion stems from a deep love for outdoor activities like skiing, hiking, and surfing, fueling their commitment to preserving the environment for future generations.

Q: ☕️ Dream Coffee Meeting?

A-Wilkinson, if you’re reading this, give them a holler.

💡 Q: Their Aha Moment?

Their lightbulb moment was when the surge in food delivery apps during the pandemic resulted in a deluge of plastic packaging waste, they knew they had to take action.

🚀 Q: Is their traction raising eyebrows?

You bet your bottom dollar

They’ve already made a significant impact:

• reusing over 150k containers,

• diverting 10+ tons of waste,

• and avoiding 30+ tons of carbon emissions.

Their list of customers includes Walmart, Disney, Sobeys, Metro, and more.

🙈 Q: What’s been the most painful service area (law, HR, etc) you’ve had to work through during the last 1-2 years of building?

“Pricing. Figuring out how our target customer likes to buy and adapting your pricing to that schedule and process has been very difficult. But as we iterated on customer feedback it’s become highly rewarding to lock in a playbook that clicks every time.” - Jason

💼 Q: Their Growth Strategies?

🔑 Q: What do Jason + Anastaisa credit their success to so far?

“We believe our team's success has stemmed from our core values that everyone aligns with:

• persisting to excellence,

• constant learning,

• playing bigger,

• and maintaining a customer-centric focus

We haven’t hired anyone that doesn’t fit those 4 values and it’s helped us heaps as a result.” - Jason

💰 Q: Scaling Strategies?

Their strategies for scaling from current revenue to millions include:

📈 What #1 metric do their investors love?

Anastasia told us the most compelling stat our investors love to see has been the growth of reuses on the platform.

In the last year, it has scaled to 500% YoY.”

🤝 Q: What mediums have they leveraged to build relationships?

“Video calls and warm introductions have been instrumental in building strategic relationships to scale our business.” - Anastasia

💼 Q: Top pain points you’ve hit along your journey?

“Navigating pricing and adapting it to our target customers' preferences has been a challenging yet rewarding aspect of our journey.” - Jason

Wanna learn more about what Jason and Anastasia are building? Hit the button below to request an intro via email and we’ll connect you for a chat.

Until next time, stay outta the penalty box and keep innovating friends.

✌️ Young Genius