How Truly Free is Revolutionizing Laundry and Online Shopping with CEO Stephen Ezell ✨Ep. 112

Episode 112 • 29th April 2025 • Toxin Free (ish) • Wendy Kathryn

Welcome back to another episode of the Toxin Freeish podcast. As always, I'm your host, Wendy, an environmental toxins attorney, turn, clean living coach this week. I'm super pumped because my friend Steven, who also happens to be the owner and founder of Truly Free Home, the non-Toxic Cleaning Company, he is on the podcast and he's answering all the questions, even the hard ones that I had for him.

We dug into why he started truly free to begin with.

How hard it is to make clean, non-toxic cleaning products that actually work, but actually take the stains out of your laundry and actually leave your dishes sparkling clean.

And we talked about his new passion project, truly free.com. Let's dive in.

Hey, friend. Real quick before we dive into this episode, there's something you need to know. This entire podcast is funded by you. You will never hear paid ads or sponsorships on this podcast, like not ever. Why? Because I believe in full transparency, and that means only sharing the things that I.

Actually love myself when you do hear me talking about something that I love and you use my affiliate links, you get a small discount and I earn a small commission that helps keep all of my content completely ad free, and that means that anything I talk about or share is aligned with you and me and not sponsors.

So to be clear. No weird promos, no brand deals, no paid ads, just the real stuff that I use, brands I love, and literally what I probably used this morning. So if something that I mentioned feels like a fit for you, click the links in the show notes. It's a win-win and it helps keep this space truly ours. I.

So you and I actually talked for the first time, I, I wanna say it was like six months ago and I reached out and I had some questions about, your ingredients and your process and your suppliers. And honestly, I really didn't expect to get a phone call. Truly because a lot of companies, when I reach out to them and I start asking questions, they don't wanna talk to me.

And I wanna say it was a holiday. I don't even remember which holiday it was. It might have been like coming up on Thanksgiving or whatever, but it was like 6:00 PM and you called me on your cell phone. You were like, hi, I'm Steven. I own truly free, and I understand you have questions. Is now a good time?

And I was so blown away that you, the owner of the company called me super impressed. Is that just how you do things always?

No, I've always done that. Yeah. So I, I remember when it was just, I mean, we started this company, it's not like we're like some private label company, right? We start, we have a museum here in our factory and I have the original concrete mixer from Harbor Freight that we used to mix soap in.

And I used to bring the orders to the post office, like back in the day. And I, I was customer service. I was the marketer. Salesperson. I mean, I was the everything. And one of my favorite things to do was to pick up the phone. So when, when a customer called, when a member called in for a question or somebody like, I want to cancel my subscription, I'm like, are you kidding me?

Like, I'm like, I'm crying over here. Don't, don't leave us. What could we do better? So, no, I, I absolutely love talking to the world, talking to the family. Um, we don't have customers, we don't have me. We have family members and I. It's one of my favorite things to do and I feel like I wish, and I, and I, you know, I speak a lot and you know, mentor CEOs and I wish more founders and CEOs got connected to their community.

It's like. When I ask, you know, we ask new people, you know, that join the company. It's like, Hey, who do you work for? Oh, I work for Truly Free, or maybe I work for, mention the name, the supervisors. No, you don't work for truly free and you don't work for, you work for the end person. You're working for serving that family that needs us.

So if I don't embody that, then I can't expect anybody to. So, no, it's very normal. I, I talk to customers all the time. It's not as much as I wish anymore. You know, 'cause now we have like 500,000 of them and I don't have that much time, unfortunately. But, um, no, I, I love to talk to people, especially after questions about what we do and why we do it, and very passionate about, I I, I, I walk the talk, so, Nope, it's very normal.

You do, and I can vouch for that. And I've given, I've thrown some hard questions your way and you are open and transparent and honest and evolving and I just, I love talking to you because you can tell from somebody the way they talk, the way they communicate, and the way they respond to you, whether they're in what they're doing for purpose, true purpose, or um.

You know, and I'm, I'm not talking shit about entrepreneurs in general, people who start businesses and wanna make money. I, you know, money in the hands of good people does good things in this world. So I'm not saying that, but every time I talk to you, I do know it. All, everything you say comes from the heart, and I appreciate that a lot.

Well, it means it means a lot coming from a thought leader like you and a mission-driven heart center, you know, leader like you. I, I, it means a lot to me coming from you. I was recently, being interviewed on, on a stage or talking about this, like, Hey, how do you, like, why'd you do this?

I'm like, it's not to make money. Like, dude, I, I started this company on food stamps, like we were broke, right? And it was just because I, I'm driven by this mission, to serve the world and, you know, free slaves and do all the crazy things that we do and live people live a safer life. And, you know, I feel it's like, that's like the reserve tank.

Like on the car when you're, going up, see the light goes on, it's like you need fuel. There's like another 30 miles that the car, they don't tell you you actually have when a light goes on. And I feel like when you're living in your purpose and you're like living your calling, it is that when the light goes on, you're like, it's okay.

I have enough fuel to get to the next fill up so when things get tough when you're living in your calling and your purpose, it just makes that. You're able to endure. And that's the reason why most entrepreneurs and businesses fail, right? They get started and they get run for the wrong reasons.

And I'm one of the fortunate guys that, tap dancing to work every day. I work with some of the most incredible people on the planet, and we know we're leaving the, we're leaving this place better than we found it. So it makes it all worth it.

I love that. So why did you start Truly free? I know your son was your big reason, your big why, right?

Yeah, I mean, that was the genesis, right? So, my wife and I are going on 20 years married. Our, our oldest son is 17 now, but when he was an infant, he broke out in this horrific rash. It looked like we dunked him in boiling water and it was because of store bought the blue goo right from, from the store.

And when he, he was like really sick. I mean, it was like, like bloody like rashes and my wife a NICU nurse. So when she freaked out, of course I freaked out even more so like straight to the pediatrician, to the dermatologist and the way of the pharmacy. A friend of the family called and asked me what we're using for laundry detergent.

I'm like, I'm not here to talk about laundry, like the baby's sick. He's like, no, no. Like that's. Possibly why he has this. I'm like, really? I had no idea. And um, so that was the, you know, we, so we, she gave me this like homemade concoction, like, fill up the bathtub and put borax and vinegar and dah, dah, dah, dah, and like do this thing.

And we did. And the next day he was fine. So I'm like, oh my gosh. And we're about to give my wife all this prophylactic chemicals like steroids and antibiotics. 'cause she was breastfeeding. Giving him all this stuff. And it was because of like the store bought Blue Goose. So I became a full blown eagle conspiracy theorist. I mean, I like, and then, but I'm an entrepreneur and I got to a point, Wendy, about, 13, 14 years ago when I, , was. Buying the soap company Northern Michigan. I didn't know anything about this industry. I'm not a chemist, I'm a restaurateur chef from New York City, and, but I felt so called to this purpose because of my experience, and I realized that, originally I thought like all these companies trying to kill us, and they're actually not trying to kill you.

They're trying to sell you. They're trying to monetize you. And when I saw the lack of legislation in this industry, we've sold millions of products, we have shipped millions of things over the years, and nobody's ever knocked on our door to say, Hey, what you actually put in your product?

And the label, is it really there? Like, it's completely like the Fox's guard in the hen house. And I'm like, well, I can either go about this through advocating and legislation. And I'm like, I am a really crappy politician. I said, or we'll solve it by empowering customers to vote differently with their dollars.

So I said, I'm just gonna take their market share. And a little funny story, like, a couple years ago I got approached by a very major. Well-known corporation, right? That buys brands like us and they were introduced by a friend. So I was cordial and we went through a little process and they offered me a, a number that would've completely changed my life,

and changed my, my, the trajectory of my grandkid's life. And I haven't met my grandkids yet. And I said, you know what guys? I'm so sorry. I don't wanna waste any more time. I'm having way too much fun. No, thank you. I really appreciate the offer, but I just still tap dancing to work. I'm having too much fun.

And they said me. Okay, well just let us know. We can come back for you. I'm like. No, no, no. You don't understand. I'm coming for you. Don't worry about coming back for me. I'm coming for you. And when you stop putting toxic chemicals on children's backs, then maybe I'll leave you alone. But until that point, like I'm coming to eat your lunch.

Respectfully yours, Steven. So yeah, so I'm one of the lucky guys. I work with great people. We do great things and we're. Building really cool things between the two companies. We're we are the, the tech, we are the encyclopedia brittan, if that's still a thing. Textbook of what is a mission-driven company.

I love it and we're gonna talk more about truly free market, but first, I, I wanna kind of like stay here for a little bit and talk about, you know, my audience is really, a group of, large group of people who are trying to make better decisions every single day for their family and they're trying to live a more holistic life.

You and I were joking about our biohacking. We got on the video and I like have my. My glasses and my essential oils going, and you're sitting on your PEMF mat. And I do think there is this movement towards we need to be more in nature and we need to be more holistic in everything that we're doing. And you and I share a similar story.

My daughter had eczema. We lived in Italy at the time. It was awful. And the pediatricians wanted to give her steroids and all these things and. I went to an Italian pediatrician who was like, oh yeah, just throw away all of your American products and here go buy these clean European, you know, products.

And I half thought he was crazy, but like you in desperation. I was like, well, I'll do anything at this point because what I, all these things I've been trying aren't working. And six weeks later she had no eczema and my migraines that I had suffered for 20 years, it disappeared. And I was in the industry.

I mean, now that was the crazy thing for me is like I was already like in the drinking water toxins world. I was already doing cleanup. I was already working in legislation and I was like, how did, how did I not think about my laundry detergent? Because people assume I. This is all regulated. If you're putting something on your body, if you're using something to wash your clothes, like clearly somebody out there is saying this is, you know, okay.

Or this is not okay. And just like you said, that none of that is true, like literally none of that is true whatsoever.

There's so much buried in U-S-P-T-O, US United States Patent Trademark Office law. Like there's so much trade secreting. I mean, honestly, like the, we go out of our way to educate c you know, , our members of what is in our product, what's in the world. And, , there are, as you know, and, and I know you speak to a very educated, listener base. There are over 12,000 chemicals banned in the eu. Over 12,000 and I think there were, I think we're finally up to 16. Up to, up till three years ago, there was 12.

I was 12.

I think we're up to 16 now that's frightening. There's 11,000 some odd chemicals that around the world are like, no, you can't make them, you can't manufacture them.

You can't import a product that has that in them. In the US it's like, hey, it's all good.

Free for all capitalism.

ca capitalism and I'm a capitalist, right? Like I am an unabashed capitalist, but I am not a crony capitalist, and that's what we see today, right? We're, we're in a, in a crony capitalism world where large mega corporations could buy the legislations so that they can be capitalistic.

And that's not cool. I think that's nonsense. And that's why this is stuff that really fires me up and. And creating the world a better place and empowering people to vote differently with their dollars. 'cause that's how real change happens. It's not gonna ha, I mean, I realize like we talk about and just so much, and I'll just say manufactured division amongst us, it's ma, this division between left and right and this and that.

It is manufactured division. And it's only there to control the minds of men, right? And I mean men like mankind, not just men, but mankind. And real change is not gonna happen every two or four years when you go to your local voting precinct and cast some ballot. Real change happens with the who we vote, with our attention, and who we vote with our money.

That's how, that's how stuff really fricking changes. I joke around about this one a lot. Like, , organic spinach is not the same price of its genetically modified distant cousin because a bunch of farmers became philanthropist, it's because enough consumer says, this is what I want it.

Either Big Ag was gonna lose. Market share to some granola crunch and hippies, or they were gonna find a way to pivot and they did. And we can talk about all these various industries where, you know, people that were naturally minded have changed their buying behavior and now big companies are having to pivot.

Either they're gonna have to pivot, or some cases , they buy great brands, right, that are doing good things. And some of those brands then get bastardized. Because it's in the pursuit of making margin. And for us, like it's hard. I mean, if it wasn't for this, our refillable concept where we take all of this shipping and packaging and logistical waste out of the supply chain and pass those savings to a customer, we couldn't compete.

It's only because of this, and I invented refillable cleaning products with a grandma that was my business partner years ago, like in a garage with a concrete mixture to solve a business problem because we, how do you get products in the hands of, well, you can't, when you're competing with these mega, giant companies.

That's the only way that we're able to compete. Price per load or price per, spray with, you know, the big guys is 'cause we've taken so much cost out of it through refillable products, less logistics, less shipping cost. But other than that, you can't compete. We used to buy products by a bag.

Now we buy stuff by tractor trail loading. , we've do a lot of volume now, but we're starting like you can't compete with these giants. They buy stuff by warehouse and rail car.

I, you know, I tell people all the time, like they'll go shop at like a small clean beauty company or clean makeup company and I work with a lot of them behind the scenes and consult with them on ingredients and, and those kinds of things. And they say if we can just get to like 10,000 units, right? If we could just grow and get enough market share to where our next order can be, double or a little bit bigger.

Then we can get those pieces at lower prices and we can pass those savings onto our customers. And so I always tell people, the more market share you can give to these companies, the more you're gonna change the entire industry. Because then their prices can come down and they can start competing with big guys.

But like you say, when you're ordering, cargo ships full of this stuff and you've got somebody sitting in, their room saying, I wanna make this clean makeup or this clean, whatever it is, and they wanna order like 500. And not only that, they can't even get manufacturers to make something that clean because they have to custom make those ingredients and they're not willing to do it.

And so supporting companies that are doing the right thing, and like you said, vote with your dollar every single day by what you bring into your home.

No doubt, no doubt. I mean, I could share countless war stories and, and again, like the, the call I would get from my, my controller business partner years ago, like, I don't know how we're gonna make payroll this Friday. I. I dunno how we're gonna do this. I'm like, well, God's got a plan, we're gonna keep going.

Like I, and, and that's again, that was the reserve tank. And now, you know, we're definitely, grown up a little bit since then, which has been quite the journey I. But you know, for, for if anybody's listening to this and you're a startup and you're an entrepreneur, like the, if you're grounded in your purpose, the grind is worth it.

It's the sacrifice is worth it. But if you're thinking about starting something to go change the world and build a product or build a service, know that, like, it's gonna be really, really hard, but it's also gonna be really worth it.

I love that. That's good advice. Well, let's talk about your products. Let's pivot. Let's talk about your products. I am just gonna get on my little soapbox for a second and say that, you know, I sell a lot of clean, clean cleaning products, brands. There's some wonderful, wonderful brands out there. And I don't, I am not somebody who only represents a single brand.

I will fight for every brand doing the right thing. That's just who I am. But it's interesting because over the years as people have really, my audience has grown, people have really started cleaning out their homes. Cleaning products, laundry detergent specifically is the one thing that people will come back to me and say, yeah, that doesn't work for me.

My husband's clothes still stink. My son stains are still, you know, in the baseball uniform or whatever. Like the idea of switching to something cleaner, people typically will. Want something that works comparably or almost comparably, right? They're willing to take a little bit of a hit for performance, usually if it is something that is clean and safe and non-toxic for their family.

But the laundry detergent

I will challenge, I'll challenge that. Wendy.

okay, go ahead.

don't know if I agree with you. I don't,

Which part? I said a lot of things.

I don't know if I agree with you that people are willing to compromise a little. I. You know, I think especially today, I mean, wallet share is tighter than ever. And if you have your choice between, yep, I've got some really safe laundry detergent, or I need to replace my kids' wardrobe, that's tough, right?

I don't think most people are really willing to compromise stains on their clothes. At the pursuit of living a non-toxic life. And that has put us at, that's why we've always tried to be on the cutting edge of green chemistry. Because the one, the industry, because of companies like Truly Free and some other great brands that are out there who I don't even view as competitors, many of them probably think I'm a competitor to them.

And that's cool. And most of them copy what we do and that's fine. But those are not the competitors. The competitors are the guys that are making the toxic blue goo. Those are the competitors and those are the ones I want to eat their lunch. I don't want to compete at the same trough with all the eco brands.

Like, no, we want to, I wanna empower those entrepreneurs to take market share from the big guys. 'cause the big guys are the ones that are hurting the real people. So that's, that's, the mission. I don't think consumers wanna, want to compromise on clean dishes or clean clothes at the pursuit of potentially being low tox or no tox or eco, whatever the label is,

I think most people, I think you're right. If you're gonna take their market share and you wanna go eat their lunch, you're right. You gotta perform. The way they perform. There are like my audience, they will choose the holistic, they will choose the cleaner. They will go get some vinegar and add it to their dishwasher, right?

They will go the extra mile to be clean. But if you wanna go after that, 95% people who are buying the blue goo. I agree with you, and whenever anybody comes to me and says I'm unhappy with how my laundry smells, I'm unhappy with how my laundry's coming out, and I know they're using something that's super, super clean, especially if they have hard water.

I always say Switch to truly free because you have the one laundry detergent. That really works in hard water. So can we talk about like how you formulated it that way, how difficult that was to make a laundry detergent that actually cleans well in that is nontoxic in hard water.

The two single hardest products to, to create and manufacture for efficacy in the entire cleaning category. So if you think about, you got the supermarket, there's the laundry aisle, which has everything, laundry, and then you go one aisle over and it has like everything else. So there's basically two big aisles at the laundry store, or one really long aisle split in half.

There's two products categories that are just brutal and one is laundry, and the second is dishwasher, auto dishwasher. And the reason being is the single largest ingredient in laundry is your water, so like I tell people, like our products are actually not cleaning anything. Like you could buy even the blue goo cleans nothing.

It's the water inside of your washing machine or your dishwasher. That's all the cleaning and what you're asking us to do, our job is to alter the water that's inside the washing machine or inside the dishwasher to get the water to do what we want it to do, so that it does and gets the clothes clean.

La la la and whatever the, the end result we're trying to get, get to. And when you get to washing machines. That adds a layer of complexity. High efficiency washers specifically don't add a lot of water, right? From an environmental standpoint, that's wonderful. From a cleaning standpoint, it's fricking brutal, right?

Because you know you want to get the clothes wet, and here's like a home hack. If you're seeing, like, if you're having a hard time getting stains outta your clothes, I don't care what you're using, put less clothes in your washing machine. That's number one. Like don't overload the washer, especially if you have a high efficiency washer, which like 75, 75, 80% of the world like us has he washers now, like these clothes have to get wet.

So that's the one thing. So that's why it's so hard. , so we've again, from a, been on the cutting edge of green chemistry for a lot of years, , looking at, plant-based or, or naturally derived chelators to get, hard water deposits outta clothes. It's not just removing stains, but you gotta keep the stains and all that chemistry.

'cause they don't disappear, right? When you washing clothes, they don't, the stains don't disappear. They're just in now in water and we have to get them. Out of the water and down the drain before they redeposit onto close. So there's so much science that goes into this, and again, I am a chef from New York City, like I'm a cook.

Like 15 years ago when I bought the soap company Northern Michigan, I knew a little less than nothing about laundry. I only knew to buy the big brie bottle that grandma always bought. But there's so much that goes into it. So I mean, we're talking over a decade, Wendy, of innovation and testing. And now we've just recruited it.

We're building a hu incredible innovations team and I'm actually recruiting innovators and chemists from the toxic industry. Like we're

Good. Steal 'em all.

we're, we're going. We're literally going. And they're like, 'cause a lot of them, like, you know, we just hired an amazing director of innovation and she's worked on some, I mean, I can't mention the brand, but some of the biggest brands , in the personal care and cleaning industry.

And she's like, I just couldn't do this anymore. Like, I just could. I'm like, great, but just so you know, I'm gonna make fun of you for the next 10 years. Like, and if you're good with that, we're good. You know? So yeah. So it's, and that's the challenge, right? The challenge is a lot of startups don't have the type of resources that we do.

I. Now, but we always didn't. And it was just a lot of testing, a lot of grit, working with suppliers, putting their feet to the fire on transparency, end to end transparency. Like, okay, so you, oh, so you're a distributor. Got it. Oh, that, and then going all the way back to like source of origin, which is so exhausting and so hard.

But we've been fortunate to have great partners, great suppliers, great partners that know how crazy I am. And just knew that I was just gonna be the biggest pain in the butt that they were gonna work with, but it would be worth it. And now we've got great partners. So

that, and you are, every time I talk to you, you're always innovating. You're always working on the formula. You're always tweaking. Let's talk about your signature scent laundry detergent, because this topic makes circles and circles, and it always, always comes around. And so you have two offerings that you have.

You have your unscented version, and then you have your signature scent. And because you're a refillable company, which I also from an environmental perspective. And I know it's a cost to savings and it's a shipping savings and a logistic savings. But as an environmental attorney, it's also, you know, savings to our environment.

We've saved 18 million pieces of plastic from ever being made.

It's incredible. I love it. It's incredible. So I get asked a ton. Your signature scent, you know, it is very strong when it comes out of the packet. It is very strong. And then you add the water to the con, right? And you bring the water up and then you run it through the wash, and then you run it through the dryer.

When the dryers come out on the other side, it has like a little bit of his sun, right? Because people are like, I want my laundry to smell good. 'cause they think pine forests are like, what? Clean smells like. And so. You do use what I call nature identical synthetic oils in that laundry detergent, and that's because that's the only way for it to survive.

You and I have had this conversation, but can you kind of talk about your thought process behind that? Because everything else that you have in truly free is all essential oils or anything like that. What made you use those nature identical synthetics for the scent of the laundry

It's because of the dang water that we talked about in the washing machine, right? That cult that, that's that thing called water. So I'll tell you, so when we first started the company, we only had a essential oils only pure the end. And I put my, we're no, we're only gonna have a essential oils pure the end.

I don't care if anybody wants it, until people didn't want it. And people would call and cancel. Remember I used to, like, we started this conversation around phone call. I was the guy on the phone. Like I would take the customer service calls and people say, I'm canceling. Well, why? Well, my clothes aren't clean.

Okay. What's not clean in your clothes? They're just not clean. Got it. Are there specific stains that we're not getting out that maybe we could try and figure out how to get out? Is it grass stains, is it, no, they, the stains are getting out. Okay. But you see your clothes are not clean. What is it? Why are the clothes aren't clean?

He goes, and then, and it would literally distill down to one thing. My clothes don't smell like anything.

Descent. Yep.

And at the time I had a business partner and she was like, we need to go like plant-based fragrance, oils, nature, identical synthetic. We have to go that route. No, I said, so this is what I'm gonna do. I left the office one day.

I'm on a two day experiment. I went to Bed Bath and Beyond when they were still open, you know, and I grabbed two brand new Egyptian cotton white hand towels. And I came outta the parking lot and I wiped one of them on the side of my car. So it had, it wasn't like filthy, but it had like visible like black and gray stains on, on the towel, brand new.

And I went two doors down to Meyer, large supermarket in Northern Michigan, and I grabbed two of the leaning I. Fabric softener, one LA fabric softener, one detergent well-known, same company, makes them the biggest. And I put 'em in a spray bottle and I just went and I sprayed the dirty Rag and I went to the mall right down the street here in Traverse City and I met with hundreds of people and I had my, I had a lab coat on. I did, I nerded out, had my,

I would've loved to have seen this.

I wish I took videos of this stuff, right? Like thinking about content creation. This was 14 years ago. And so I took, and I, and I said, please tell me we're doing a test A or B, which one do you think is cleaner? And 74% of the people that I met at the mall chose the dirty rag.

Wow.

And I was like, oh my, you know what? I'm like, fair. This is not my people. Right. These are not my people. So I went over to the local co-op, it's called Oriana, here in Northern Michigan. Wonderful. It's like our everyday grocery store, co-op, local, amazing store, shopped every day for years. I'm like, these are my people, right?

They drive the, the parking lot is full of Subarus. The granola aisle's huge. Like these are my people. Five out of 10 of my people chose the dirty rag. And that's when I said, I can't win. I can't win. Because you know, a large company did a study many years ago in the seventies. And what do women want?

the, in the late two, in late: 2008

That's all she could articulate. But what she really wanted was fragrance. That's when the entire industry pivoted. 'cause it was always about fragrance. It always was. They just didn't know that's what they did. That's what she wanted. And that's where this, that's why we have this adv, or these scent beads and these crazy freaking things is because it's about the sensory experience.

It's not only about getting the clothes clean, they have to smell. So yeah. So we pivoted. You can't get essential oil. You could take a bottle of lavender essential oil. 80 bucks dumped a whole dang thing inside the washing machine. It comes out, smells like nothing.

Yep.

So that's why we did it. Right? And we've always been on the cutting edge of even plant-based fragrance chemistry.

And we're still pushing the envelope 'cause there's been so much innovation in the industry because of crazy cats like us that many fragrance houses and bi and you know, raw material manufacturers are making safer alternatives. Because brands like truly free and others are doing good, and they're creating market share.

And we're constantly updating and taking stuff out and upgrading it for better eco toxicity profiles and efficacy and, and like, we're never motivated by margin. We're just not, like, if we can make more, if we could pick up margin of product, that's cool. But it has to, it has to have a better profile and work better than it did before.

That's the standard. And that's why we have, that's why we just don't put essential oils and, and if people that I don't my close smelling anything great. Neither do I.

Yeah, that's, you have an unscented version. Have at it. Yeah. Yeah.

at it, and dump a bottle of lavender oil in the laundry machine if you want.

You're really right though about the green chemistry. I just worked with, , the company Wild Notes to release a 100% botanical perfume fragrance, and it lasts six, six hours. Some people are texting me saying, I, I woke up the next morning and I can still smell it is 100% botanical. There is nothing in it. I worked with them.

It's the green chemistry. And you know, kind of similar to you, we stole someone from the big fragrance industry, and said, here's our standards, can you do it or not? And they, they jumped at the, it was a challenge for them. They were like, I'm all in, let's do this. Right? Because we were using regenerative organic essential oils.

It turned out amazing. But 10 years ago, that wouldn't happen 10 years ago. That, the knowledge and the green chemistry and the formula, it just, it wouldn't have happened. And so, you know, things really are changing for the better. Now, I will say, can we talk about your drier angel, because that is essential oils.

You throw it in your dryer and my freaking clothes smell amazing. How does

my, it's my favorite product. It is unequivocally the favorite thing we've ever created. So yeah, it's a dry angel. It's a sew, hand sew product, and it, there's a refillable sachet, corn cob media, the same type of media that they use when they like sand blast, like a log cabin. It's corn. Corn husks.

We impregnate those steep that in a blend of essential oil that we came up with. Smells amazing. And you throw the dryer range inside the dryer fluff flips a clo nice smell. That's like a wool dryer ball. Reduces static, but leaves a really awesome smell that does stick for more than 15 minutes,

Yeah, I love it.

and yeah, I love that. But it's not my favorite product for that reason. It's because of how we make it. So we have, um, we started off years ago with a ministry out of, out of Jamaica called Caribbean Christian for the Deaf. And, um, they, we have 12 full-time women in Jamaica that sew, hand sew dry angels.

And, um, years ago, like especially the beginning of Covid, when we really like took off, um. They couldn't keep up with our growth. So that one product has rescued hundreds of women from slavery. We, we, we help impact, we get women out of, out of bondage. They get rehabilitated, they get healed, taught a new identity.

And then many get sustainable jobs working in. So shops around the world that we fund, and a lot of underground stuff where we literally like buying women out of slavery. So yeah, it's a favorite product of mine for that reason. It's such a, a cool story. We've liberated so many people out of, out of bondage, and that's why it's my favorite product.

I love that. Thank you for sharing. My audience is really gonna. Dig that too. So I know they're gonna see your, your big heart. And whenever everybody asks me about you, they're like, yeah, what about this product or this ingredient? And I said, you know what? If you ever talk to him, he will tell you whatever you wanna know.

He will tell you what, like he'll talk about anything. But what you're just gonna see is just his big heart for his mission of what he does, which is something I value a lot. I wanna go to my favorite topic, which is you just built the truly free. So can you share about what that is and, and why you built it?

Sure. So truly free home.com. It's my baby, right? It's been an amazing journey and like I said, I, when I could have sold and generated an incredible amount of wealth for my family, I said not. I'm not, you know, I'm coming for you. Don't worry about coming from me. And, along this journey. It's hard, right?

Building a small business and a brand in today's day and age is just flipping hard. It's so hard to build a relationship with the end customer. It's so hard to scale and grow. The cards are so unequivocally stacked against small businesses. Then, so you look at the complicated landscape of building a business.

You look at the very, you know how hard it is for wallet share today. People are being forced to compromise their values for just things. I mean, like, if you have your choice between, non-toxic this or vacation. Groceries. Like you're gonna choose groceries as you should. And then, you know, becoming friends with so many thought leaders like you and, and the last few years have been a little spicy for thought leaders that want to, that are challenging the paradigm. There was this thing called free speech back in the day. It was a good, it was a great idea. Maybe there's some semblance of that being restored today in our country. We'll find out. So I just looked at this very complicated landscape and I just asked a crazy question what if there was a place where great mission-driven brands can connect with customers, with and consumers in a new way and connect them with thought leaders and creators and where everybody wins, right?

Where these big monster tech companies don't steal the data of the customer and steal the data of the small business and. Resell it to a higher bidder, many times a foreign hack. And that was like the first question. That was four and a half years ago. So we've just invested four and a half years building the world's first fully decentralized social commerce platform.

It's called truly free.com. I. It is a, it is the, a free market. It is a free speech social platform. It is a marketplace full of great brands. We create our own, , digital currency where when people join, they get free money put in their wallet, and every millisecond that somebody buys something around the world, more money gets put in their wallet via our digital currency call talents.

It is. Commerce and communication, reinvented and truly free home, like I said, is my baby. And, but I feel that truly free.com is my calling and I feel like it's why God put me here is to help people buy, sell and exchange ideas in a new way. , and it's been an incredible journey and we just launched it in April, like right now, like we're just turning this thing on after years and years of building software. And it's going incredible. I mean, there are hundreds of brands that are signing up that have already signed up or signing up great products from all over the world. Thought leaders like you, it's just been this, it's, it's very humbling, right? As a genetically unemployable entrepreneur, um, to start off, you know, from idea to, and now seeing it manifest, it's, uh.

It's very surreal. So yeah, so that's truly free. It is a new place to buy, sell, and exchange ideas. And if we get this right, if enough people rally around this, and start voting differently with their dollars at scale. We can change industries. This isn't just about cleaning products anymore.

Cleaning products are important, very passionate about it as but, it's more than that. It's about, , it's about changing things. We're all sitting on devices. Many of you are are on a smartphone right now. Like, and we can all be saying, oh, we're, we're mission-driven people and we live these, , low impact lives and we're mission-driven folks, but.

The devices that we're on right now probably most likely contributed to a child's slave in the Congo at mining, cobalt and lithium so that we can have a battery that's not cool, but what if, and there are emerging small businesses and companies that are trying to combat this with sustainably, like ethically sourced.

Battery manufacturing. Well, if we can get enough of those people buying a different phone. Which is a crazy idea, or different batteries. Then what's gonna happen? These big companies that are buying dirt cheap cobalt from child through child slavery are gonna have to pivot, or they're gonna have to start treating like stop.

Like they're gonna have to change their ways or we're gonna put 'em outta business. This is just like one, again, I'm zeroing on a one microcosm, but it's like. This is the world that we're living in, and that's what truly free represents. Now. It's more than just sustainable and non-toxic refillable cleaning products.

We represent a way of life and a way for free commerce to happen in a real way. And we're just turning this baby on. It's gonna be an incredible journey.

Are you trying to steal all the Amazon shoppers? I, I was, as I was thinking about and I was skimming through, , the shop, I thought to myself, I work with a lot of companies who are on Amazon because this is quotes that they tell me we have no choice. And you know, Amazon has policies where if people are selling, you know, your products illegally, the only way for you to do anything about it is if you first have a presence.

On Instagram or on, Amazon, that's a requirement. You have to have a presence. You have to sell that the products that you're complaining to them that are being sold illegally on their platform. And so they force companies to come into their platform, , in order to police up contraband, fake fraud, illegal whatever, people who are taking things and, and selling them illegally, even if they're not completely fraudulent.

So there is this market social slash construct that's happening over on Amazon where com companies can't compete. They can't, and I'll be totally honest, you said you people are gonna put groceries on their table. I just did six interviews with, with students of mine that take my toxin free and three course.

And the one thing that I say, what is the biggest challenge? And they say, if I have to go buy things from each individual company, right? It's not all in one place. I have to pay shipping for each single one of those. Like that adds up. By the time I've bought my cleaning products from truly free and my makeup from with simplicity and my, this from over here and my essential oils over here and whatever, like now I've paid over $120 for shipping from six different companies.

And so Amazon, that centralization of shipping people are like, I need to buy groceries.

It adds up and I listen. I can empathize with that. And the cool part is that even what we've done in a decentralized way, we can create that convenience and that end to end. Customer value in a way that's never been done before. We have multiple patents filed, many of which we're not gonna file. 'cause I believe a lot of the ideas that were downloaded to me, I want to be open source and I want the world to copy me.

And that's okay. Right. And, I think what's what's unique about, , listen, Amazon is a, is it is a necessary place. Truly free home. Amazon is on Amazon. Why? Well, because as we've scaled so much, we found that first in an e-commerce world over 50%, over one out of two. E-commerce searches originate at Amazon.

Somebody, if somebody's looking for something, one out of two people start their shopping experience by searching Amazon. Amazon is not a marketplace. It's a search engine, right? It is a technology company. So when we found that so many p you know, brands and real competitors, not the, not the good brands, but the dangerous brands were buying our keywords. Getting people that were looking for us to buy there. I said, gee, we have to be there. Like, so we went on Amazon purely out of a defensive play. It was purely outta defense. Obviously that channel's grown a lot and it's very successful for us. But for brands that are really like Amazon first, it's tough, right?

It's really tough. So, we make it really easy. So , if anybody here is listening and you have a brand, a small business, like, you know. Head over to truly free.com. Let us know that, that Wendy sent you over. We'll give you the VIP treatment. But this is a, a very, very unique place to build a business and a brand, but it's more about building a relationship with the customer because now through truly free social and free chat, the customer can actually have, can consume content, engage with that brand directly, message them, communicate.

All of that data is fully end-to-end encrypted, so you don't have to worry. Like we're not gonna send your email address and your phone number to all these companies. Like you can communicate and your data's held sovereign, and we don't sell it to anybody. Like your data stays sovereign within our decentralized ecosystem.

And there's all fancy big words, but we've reinvented commerce, right? So that people can connect in a new way and vote differently with their dollars.

I love that. So I have links to truly free home for people who wanna go check it out. And, uh, my audience knows how much I love your product. So I've got links and discount codes always. Um, Steven, will you come back sometime?

Oh, I'd love to, love to hang out for sure.

I'd love to, uh, get an update

How about this? Why don't you next time come to Northern Michigan? Take a look at a take. You know, come to our factory here, take a look and we'll go in my podcast studio and we'll lay it down here.

oh my God, I love that. We're gonna do it.

Okay. Summertime in Northern Michigan's coming, it's the perfect time to come to Northern Michigan.

I'm there. You don't have to sell me. We're gonna do it. All right, Steven, thanks so much for being here.

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