PITTSFIELD, Maine — In a small home in Pittsfield, dental floss is packed into containers ready to be shipped around the globe. Jodi Breau is the founder of Dental Lace; a zero-waste product, and she's the first to tell you she's not an entrepreneur.
"I was a school librarian at Messalonski and I said to my staff, 'look at this it's so ugly and it's plastic,' and I was having a little rant about it and I said, 'You know what? Somebody ought to change this,' and they said, 'Why don't you?' That was 20-something years ago, people didn't care about plastic then," Breau remembers.
Her idea didn't take hold until years later when she retired in 2015. "I looked at my husband Jim and I said, 'what am I gonna do with myself? I'm going to get so bored.'"
It took months of research to find the right product; floss made from 100% silk with a plant-based wax and essential oil for the mint. Then, the right glass container, the right logo - designed by a woman from Maine - and the right help.
"From the very beginning, I made an online store on Shopify. On January 2, 2017, I sent the URL to my sister and said, 'look what I did.' She posted it on Facebook... by the end of the week I was getting orders from people all over the country." By 2017 Breau had realized the power of social media and started sending samples to Instagram influencers.
"So when we got close we ordered another 5,000 and then another 10,000 and now we're up to 40,000 every six weeks," Breau says. Which meant, working out of a spare bedroom in her Cape Elizabeth home wouldn't cut it anymore. When it was time to expand, she turned to her hometown of Pittsfield, once booming with factories - many of which have closed.
"I haven't brought a lot of jobs here," says Breau. "But hopefully someday that's the dream. What if I could re-open one of those Mills and have assembly and fulfillment and distribution?"
What started as a simple spool of silk in a glass container with a bonus refill, has now sparked partnerships with other Maine companies working to reduce waste. Not bad for a "retirement gig" that is now changing the way people think about dental hygiene all around the world.
"I know I'm eliminating plastic, we are eliminating plastic around the world. Granted it's a tiny little dental floss container but it adds up and it feels great to know I'm making a difference."
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