Sustainable bamboo toilet roll

Using fast-growing bamboo reduces de-forestation

Spotted: Seattle-based Cloud Paper is working to save forests and money with their toilet paper made from fast-growing bamboo. According to the company, 40,000 trees are cut down every day to meet consumer demand for toilet paper and kitchen roll, contributing to almost 20 per cent of global deforestation. Instead, the company uses sustainably farmed bamboo with a fully-validated supply chain.

The company relies on trusted third parties, such as the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), to certify the bamboo as fully sustainable. They are also certified by the Natural Resources Defense Council, and have a U.S. Department of Agriculture biobased certificate. All of this validation is intended to give consumers confidence that the brand is made from properly renewable resources. Bamboo is a grass, so it grows back immediately – which means no deforestation. It also absorbs more carbon and releases more oxygen than trees, so it is an efficient carbon sink.

Cloud Paper was started as a business-to-business company — targeting restaurants and hotels. Then COVID-19 hit, and the company began a household subscription programme that has proven very popular. Now ready to return to B2B, Cloud Paper recently raised $5 million in a funding round that included from Bezos Expeditions (the personal investment company of Jeff Bezos), Marc Benioff’s TIME Ventures, Presight Capital, Soundwaves, and Jeff Wilke.

Cloud Paper is not alone in seeing a future in bamboo. At Springwise, we have covered a large number of bamboo-based innovations, from a reusable bamboo coffee cup that doubles as a loyalty card to bamboo sleepwear that repels insects.