Founder Feature: Steph Nightingale of Stimmie

0:02A few years back when I ran a beverage company, we had to launch using those plastic sleeves to put our designs on the cans. But they looked bad. The sleeves get stretched out. They don't cover the full can. And overall, they just look and feel low quality. Lucky for you, digital can printing technology has come so far over the last few years that now you can launch your beverage brand or new SKUs with a fully printed look. And it's at similar pricing to those plastic sleeves. our friends at can works which is the largest u.s based digital can printer are happy to work with our community at very low minimums even one palette they've got locations on the east coast the west coast texas get in touch with them through our contact form it's at canworksprinting.com slash startup cpg

0:59so when I've had patients come to me and say oh my god that tool you showed me changed my life and they're not being sarcastic they say I've lived with my boyfriend for three years I've never been able to share a bathroom with him I've been so embarrassed to spit in the sink living with him and ever since you showed me that tool my mouth is healthy Hey everybody, this is Caitlin Bricker, editor at Startup CPG. We are back with another founder feature. Today we're talking with Steph Nightingale, founder of Stimmy, a premium reusable toothpick that's modernizing oral care. After 13 plus years working in dental care, Steph turned her post-surgery recovery into a business opportunity by creating an ergonomic tool that gets around teeth where floss and toothbrushes simply miss.

1:49From bootstrapping through investors to winning innovation contests and landing in high-end retailers, she's proving that the best products come from real-world feedback. This is an extra special episode because I actually have not tried Stimmy yet, but the buzz from UNFI West was way too strong to ignore, so I had to talk to her. Enjoy.

2:13Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Startup CPG podcast. This is Caitlin, and today I'm here with Steph Nightingale, founder of Stimmy. Steph, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. It's nice to meet you. It's great to meet you too. I am very excited to have you on. This is an extra special episode for me. It's very special for listeners too, because I am coming at this with the perspective of somebody who hasn't yet tried your product, but you've been so hyped up after the UNFI West show out in Las Vegas that I had to get you on before I could get my hands on the product. So I'm very, very excited to dive into this with you.

2:54Oh my God, that makes me so happy. And it's crazy because before meeting, I guess, Daniel and everyone at the show. I always felt like there was a club that all these founders were a part of, but I couldn't pinpoint what it was. And I'm like, there has to be some things. Everyone's traveling in groups, doing the same thing. And then I guess I figured it out once I joined the Slack channel that this is very much a community and a private club. And I've said it on LinkedIn, and I'll say it again, since that show, it has absolutely been the catalyst to what's going to happen next with Stimmy. And I really feel like you guys have changed my life.

3:33Okay. That is a really good way to start the episode. I talk about it all the time. So yeah, well, I'll keep you posted. But so far, it's been unbelievable from that show. Wow. I'm excited to hear more and I will definitely be staying tuned on LinkedIn. So before we dive into everything Stimmy, walk us through just a brief introduction to what stimmy is for anybody who's listening and isn't familiar yeah so in a nutshell stimmy we've modernized a toothpick we've made it premium reusable sustainable it's ergonomic it's designed to fit in your pocket it is not something that replaces floss it does not floss the teeth it actually gets around the teeth in areas where traditional floss and even your toothbrush would miss, but it's amazing for quick touch-ups on the go.

4:26It's amazing for all teeth and gums, and it actually just feels really, really amazing when you use it in your mouth. So where does the name Stimmy come from? There is a backstory. It was 50-50 people that love the name and hate the name, and ultimately it happened completely by accident. I had gum surgery December 30th, 2020, and when I was frozen and my gums were throbbing, I know from being in the dental field that it's good to use a gum stimulator after you've had surgery. And you're not to brush the site. You're not to floss the site. But you do want to gently manicure around the gums. And you can gently massage the tissue to help with the healing.

5:06Just like when you have any surgery, they say like gentle massage for healing is very good. So I kept saying like, I need my stimulator. I need my stimulator. And I I had the original one. Rubber tips have been around since 1951. So I have one in my bathroom that's like a long gold metal handle. They've been around forever. And my husband kept saying, you need a stimmy what? You need a stimmy what? I'm like, go get me a stimmy. And he said, I don't know what that is. And I said, you know, I'm going to create it. So he brought me the one I was talking about upstairs. And I said, I'm actually going to make one that's smarter.

5:42and I'm going to bake in all my patient feedback over the last, at the time, 13 years. And I'm going to make it cute. I'm going to make it sexy. I'm going to make a whole brand around it. And he's like, no one's ever going to buy that. And the name is awful. So you can never name a product that. And I just went with it. And yeah, four and a half years later, it's still 50-50. The baby boomers hate the name. The Gen Zs and millennials love the name. And they're the ones running our economy right now with buying products. So I will take it if they love it. And your husband must use it. Oh my God.

6:21He is literally at the stairs right now. I went to go get my charger before this and he was sitting at the computer using it. Joke's on you. Yeah. So he actually did say, because I'm sure you've heard this from many founders. It's very hard on couples. It's very hard on families, especially if you have kids. And he so badly, he actually he said like I so badly wanted to hate this product I so badly wanted to hate it he's like but I actually love it but that's what everyone says once they've tried it okay this might sound like a little TMI you said you had gum surgery and stimmy came from that and needing to like massage the area I don't know if anybody else listening right now or if you've experienced this yourself but when I am about to get my period my gums get so inflamed I track it every every month in my cycle.

7:08It's like clockwork. And if I had a stimmy at that point in my cycle, it would change the game for me because I'm like, I just need somebody to massage my gums. But if I had a tool to do it for me, great. So I'm excited about this. And it also so that I had a conversation with my girlfriend who just got pregnant. And we talked about this yesterday. I was lucky enough to connect with a really cool gynecologist that I met on Instagram. I feel like he's like the male version of me. And we wrote like three blog posts together that I haven't posted on our website, but I will. And we talk about PCOS and gums.

7:44We talk about pregnancy, gingivitis and gums. And then we talk about menopause and saliva. So you're right. Like there are many links and connections between female hormones and the mouth. The joys of being a woman. we're not only dealing with enough I know so I picked up on you saying your patient feedback so tell us about your background and what brought you to bringing stimmy to the market yeah so I've always had a very realistic approach to dentistry since day one being thrown into a room cleaning teeth for the first time when none of us have any idea what we're doing I've never been one to be a lecturer, just talking to people robotically, asking how many times they brush, asking how many times they floss.

8:34People do that and that's their style. For whatever reason, it really makes me cringe. I don't think it's very human. I like to get to know people. I like to get to know about their habits, their day-to-day, their life. And as I'm talking to them, I wanted to be able to show them what's going on in their mouth. So I would always pick up a rubber tip because it was gentle, easy to use, easy to clean and painless. And I would go around their teeth and go around their gums and just getting to know them. And as I'm talking to them, I would pull it out and put it in front of their face. And they would go, oh, like, that's so gross.

9:06Like, but I brush every day, but I floss every day. Like, how is all that stuff in there? And then I would educate them from there. There's no value in my opinion and like sitting people down and just saying how many times, how many times and like grilling them. If there's a problem, like my job is let me find you a solution. So I would show them that. And so many people would perk up and say, well, no one's ever shown me that tool before. And my grandma had one. I never knew what it did. And I've heard that at least, you know, I stopped counting once I launched Jimmy, but leading up to launch, I actually calculated all my patients.

9:43And I heard that song and dance at least 34 ,000 times over my career. And then it would follow with, well, I currently use these things, but I hate that they bend after one use. And I currently try this, but I don't like that the wire bends and this one breaks and these are disposable. All I heard were things that people didn't like about products. And then I would ask them, well, what do you like about products? People were very specific on the thickness, on dexterity, if they were someone that had arthritis or they travel a lot, they want convenience, just all these things. So I kind of made a list.

10:21And, you know, I give my patients credit for all of this, because if I didn't have the hands-on experience and listening to pain points, and actually doing something with it, I would have never known where to start sketching, and how to start creating this thing. And when we first launched on a Kickstarter, it was just like my finger and thumb holding it up like this. And as soon as we launched our Kickstarter, no one knew what I was doing for two and a half years. And people knew behind the scenes I was building something. And the number one thing I heard was, does it come with a cap? Is there going to be a cap?

10:58Like, I want to carry this with me. Like, tell me there's a cap. And there was no cap. And then when I figured out how much it would cost to engineer a cap, it was the same amount of money to just engineer the body. I'm like, I can't afford this. I couldn't ignore the community feedback. So this is now beyond my patience. This is just the general public who discovered us on Kickstarter. And I paused everything for 18 months until I had enough working capital to actually give people what they asked for. And that's how the cap, the cap has a whole story on its own. Every detail is very intentional.

11:35So remind me, how long has it been since the inception of the idea of stimmy to today? December 30th, 2020 was when I started sketching. And you got your working capital how? How did you fund this thing? I know you mentioned Kickstarter, but there's got to be something else there. Clearly, I can tell you exact all our amounts, but I won't because I was working on a deck right now. But I did a dentist that knew behind the scenes that I was working on something. He goes, I know I'm not supposed to know, but I know you're doing something. And all I'm going to say is when you're ready, make sure you come to me first.

12:12So he wanted that first check. So it was all angel investors. I remember meeting someone who was in the space of raising and he's worked in dental before. And he said, talk to 300 people. Once you're at 300, then you can give me a call. And 300 led to 500 led to 700, just conversations and just cold reaching anyone and everyone. I don't come from an investor network. I don't come from an angel network. I don't really have the family and friends that do these sorts of things. So it was literally just cold emailing. Hey, I have a product in mind. I have a vision in my head. I have a story. Are you willing to listen to me?

12:51And then from those conversations, is this something you'd be interested in getting involved with? No. Great. Can you give me three names of other people you think that would find this interesting? Rinse and repeat. Do that 700 times. And I was able to get a small amount of money and it wasn't enough to do anything. But I was like, okay, clearly this is taking two years and I'm not getting anywhere. So then I did the Kickstarter and then I was able to get some capital from that and more investors from that. So I did get discovered on Kickstarter from some more angels. They were all strategic. So they've either been founders in the past, which I really value getting feedback and advice and dollars from other founders who have done it.

13:33and then they would introduce me to more people. So it got a little bit easier. And then I just kind of stopped and said, I'm going to go to market even though I'm not ready because you're never ready. And even though I'm not funded and there's no budget for marketing, there's no budget for ads, there's no budget for influencers, all these things that I thought I would do when going to market. I'm like, I'm just going to hit go and see what happens. And yeah, now we've been in market 14 months, but not focused on raising whatsoever. And the more you build and the more traction you get, in my experience, I was lucky enough to get some grants.

14:14Really lucky to win innovation contests with Startup CPG. Like to me, being able to go to Vegas and do all that was like the biggest gift. And I treat that as an angel investment in itself because I will absolutely see an ROI on that. And then I will be raising again soon because now there's the standard problem that most founders have is when you have like inventory management issues. Like now POs are coming in and it's like, holy cow, how am I going to make all this product to fulfill the demand? And so, yeah, now I'm going to be doing it again and I'm not looking forward to it. But hopefully it's different this time around now that I have a real business.

14:57It sounds like quite the journey, but it sounds like it's all very exciting and leading you down a path to serious growth. We'll be right back. What's up, friends? Years ago, I opened an account with one of the old banks, but they were stuck in the past. The online banking was terrible. The customer support was worse, and I basically had to go into an actual bank to deposit any check. It drove me nuts. That's why I'm so excited to tell you about our new partner for business banking, Rowe. They are in it with us. They are committed to helping emerging CPG startups grow and they can move just as fast as we all do.

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16:38So filling those POs, getting the products on shelves, how are you manufacturing, Stimmy? Oh my gosh. So right now we haven't done any like large POs. It's just been me seeding like small independent retailers, which I treat like gold because you get all your feedback and all your data and like what's working and what's not working when you are three foot with a retailer. When you're working with like, eventually when I do the big POs and I do get into the bigger accounts, you're like the 30 ,000 foot partnership. Like you're not up close and personal and you're seeing like how your product is actually moving in those four walls.

17:18So I manufacture overseas and I mean, I give my patients all the credit for the product, but I definitely give myself a lot of credit for finding amazing cross-functional partners. So just finding the right people to help you get your product through supply chain. It's not an easy task, a lot of bumps along the way, but I think I'm in a good place. I still don't sleep at night thinking about when production is in the works. I'm like, oh my God, until I can open that box and like see it for myself, I just don't sleep and can't breathe and just hold my breath. But I think these are all classic problems that I hope everyone deals with.

17:59Maybe it's just me. I don't know. I'm sure there are many people that can identify with the issues that you've been facing. I'm so lucky. It's been really, really good. I'm in a position where I had to mitigate risk and I wasn't in a spot where I could say, whoopsie, like, let's try again next time. So I've been really, really lucky. And I really love how much you've been mentioning the feedback that you've been getting from your retailers, feedback you've been getting from your customers and feedback you've been getting from your patients. I think being a founder, creating a brand, having your ears open is so valuable because you might have this tunnel vision on your product and this idea of what you want in your head.

18:41But if people aren't going to buy it, then what good is the vision? There's a lot of value in what you're saying about how much you're taking in from that feedback. and I really appreciate it. Oh, thank you. I was scrolling this morning on Instagram. There's an account. I'm sure you follow them too, School of Hard Knocks. He interviews like millionaire billionaires to get business advice to give to the next generation. He's an amazing interviewer. I think he has like 6 million followers on his account. And he interviewed someone who said, God gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason. Listen twice as much as you speak.

19:20And like, I love that. Like you can only convince someone so much to buy your product. But if you're listening to what they want, it truly does go so much further. I get no credit for that. That was all someone else's thing. But it was so good. You have to follow him. I will definitely check it out. Unfortunately, I've never heard of him before. Maybe I've been living under a rock. I will definitely check it out though. Maybe that'll be your next podcast episode. So if you're listening, School of Hard Knock, let's go. Yeah, he's great. So I'm super curious from a retail perspective because I used to be a buyer.

19:59How do you merchandise Stimmy? What does it look like on a shelf when you get into a store? So it's been a lot of test and learn. I started with the three pack on our website. So when we got into our first retailer, an awesome spot that a lot of CPG founders will start off in pop up grocer in New York, I only had a three pack. And I was still taking meetings every day. My meetings were more like just getting feedback, getting feedback. And it was someone in California that actually said to me, you know, I would be intrigued to try your product. But if I ever saw it only sold as a three pack, I would be intimidated to spend, you know, more money on three when I'm like, I don't even know if I like it enough to buy one.

20:44So it was him that said you should use singles. And singles don't make sense on my website just because like the cost is so low and to fulfill everything online is so expensive. I said, huh. So I saved up enough money, did a small run of singles, tested it out with them. And I watched my dashboard and they sold like seven and a half times quicker. But because I spent all the money on the singles, I didn't even have enough money to make like the PDQs, those like boxes that things sit in. So I'd go to the dollar store and just buy little acrylic like makeup dishes. And I would just put them in there and send them to the retailer like that.

21:24I have like little toothbrush holders that I would put them in. And funny enough, I would about six retailers in the last month who have those little dishes where we display the stimmy they've asked now if i can make them the holders to sell with the stimmy which has been kind of fun to hear too so these are all again small independents i'm hearing and seeing more that when it's right at the cash desk right at the pin pad that they sell much quicker some places that are more oral care focused or apothecary candle beauty makeup they keep them on the table but something that just happened two days before Vegas, actually, that was so fun for me.

22:04I met with a retailer in New York, and they are like super prestigious, like everyone knows about them. They've been around for I think like 35 years, probably longer. And I met with three of the men who do the buying for beauty and oral care and pharmacy. And they said, we want this, but we want a whole display. And I'll never forget, I was speaking to another founder, who I don't want to say too much, but he was very much, you know, Steph, that's sometimes people's way of saying no, but they don't want to hurt your feelings. Like them saying they want a whole display and postponing it and not buying it on the spot is their polite way of saying no.

22:41He said if they really wanted your product, they would have just purchased it. Anyways, I took a chance. I waited four months and I got very similar to what I had at the Unified Trade Show, which was just like a beautiful, like good quality board that you see at Sephora with our campaign image, a bunch of call outs on the side, an acrylic dish so that it's not in those PDQs. And then I made them the little toothbrush holders to go on the side so that it looked like a full collection. And I went to New York and I went right there with my luggage in hand and I met with the buyers. And part of me was like, oh my God, what if they're actually not interested?

23:19The minute I showed up, they all stopped what they're doing. I had three men like congregate around my product. One person scanning barcodes. One person's moving everything out of the way to create space to like create a whole stimmy display. They put us in oral care, pharmacy and beauty counter. Three spots. So it was just so cool to watch that happen. And then to have like my logo really big on a sheet of acrylic. A place here in Toronto did the same thing. He cleared a shelf in his window, put us in a window display. Another place people are sending me texts that saw us in a window display.

23:56So like that's just the coolest thing when the retailer is so proud to carry your product that they want to put you front and center. I hope that's the case everywhere. But again, it's we're still so early and so new. That's like the really long answer to your question. I love it. Well, I think that there's a lot of excitement when there is a brand that's so early and so new. Those are the founders that I seek for the podcast. Those are the brands that I'm most interested in hearing from because you're in it like you are actively building right now. You have a finished product, but you're still learning a lot.

24:32So there's a lot that you're learning and that you can share. It's just very exciting. I think all around it's a win, win, win for everyone. I hope so. It has to pay off eventually. It will. So I'm curious. Somebody buys a Stimmy now that they're in single packs. It's cool that you could get them in multi packs because if you love it so much, why wouldn't you want to share it with somebody? It's like, you know, a best friend bracelet, only a stimmy. What does the lifetime of the product look like and how do you go about cleaning it? Just like give me the nitty gritty about what it looks like for an end user.

25:08Yeah. So, I mean, just like your toothbrush every day, you're using it, you're just rinsing it with water and you're putting it out on your counter to dry. The thing with anything with bristles, it can't breathe. so as much as people are like always asking about cleanliness and do I put it in the dishwasher do I scrub it with vinegar I've heard the most like absurd things like do I need an alcohol wipe I'm like no you know that your toothbrush literally grows bacteria when you walk away from it this is just rubber so it just repels you know I say to people rinse it if you're obviously in the car and out and about I've used it and seen plaque and gunk and things on it and just waited for it to dry until I went to a bathroom and it just flakes right off.

25:49So with any oral care, we always recommend Rolafam to replace it after three months. So some people like my dad who uses it 35 times a day, his will start to bend out of shape. I also say if something does start to look bent out of shape, like just get rid of it and get a new one. One, it's not going to be as effective, but two, if naturally rubber will start to bend or even crack, that bacteria will trap inside. So you just want to get rid of it at that point. But yeah, so our standard is like one to three months for each STEMI. So it absolutely lasts quite some time. Great. That's definitely good for those sustainability focused consumers and retailers.