Tim Wetton | ERGO

1. What's your story?

I got my start in the music business working in sales, and it was here I got my first taste of E-commerce. My biggest customers were Amazon and Play.com. It wasn’t long before I jumped to the other side of the fence and set up Asia’s first online store for officially licensed music merchandise. I was in my 20’s and this was an incredible learning journey. I’d recommend going big in your 20’s and making as many mistakes as possible early on! 

Fast forward a decade and I was completely burnt out from two years at an E-commerce enabler trying to figure out what to do next. It was around this time we started using Stasher bags at home. We were hooked instantly! It was the easiest swap to make at home to reduce our over-dependence on single use plastic ziplock bags. Our habits changed overnight. It got me thinking, “If this was such an easy way for my family to change our habits, couldn’t other people move away from the ‘just throw it away’ mentality that pervades our society?” 

By choosing something that has a higher quality and a better design, that is longer lasting and improves our day-to-day life, we had almost unknowingly supported a ‘better for the planet’ cause. With none of the pressure and compromise that is sometimes associated with being more eco-conscious. 

This was the birth of Ergo and our mission to empower the average Singaporean to make simple, sustainable swaps at home in a friendly, engaging and fun way. 

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If this was such an easy way for my family to change our habits, couldn’t other people move away from the ‘just throw it away’ mentality that pervades our society?

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2. What’s the most satisfying part about what you do?

We love doing pop-ups! Let's be honest, it's not the best use of my time in terms of dollars and cents, but nothing beats getting face to face with customers and seeing that lightbulb moment where they make their first sustainable swap. 

Our brands and products are genuinely useful, super fun to use, stylish, and make it easy to take one more step towards sustainability at home. During COVID-19, we really missed these conversations at parenting fairs or farmers’ markets where we could verbally introduce our products to customers and share our stories as to how we use them with our family at home. 

There is something genuine, enjoyable and satisfying about this kind of “analogue” engagement. It’s great to get away from the laptop and phone for a while.

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3. What’s been the biggest challenge you’ve faced and how did you move forward? 

I’d say two things. 

Firstly, managing cash flow. Harvest helped us with this by introducing us to Futrli! We’d highly recommend using Futrli to get a grip on your cash flow forecasting. 

Secondly, with a plethora of digital marketing options, finding the ones that actually make an impact on our business and focusing on them. It is easy to get distracted, trying to use every single tool and chase every shiny new digital opportunity without strategy, direction or a way to measure impact. 

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4. What's the best piece of business advice you would like to share?

If you have a super small, lean team like ours, you’ll need to very carefully figure out what is core to your business and what is not. To put it another way, what should you do in-house and what should you outsource? 

In my earliest startup endeavours I tried to do absolutely everything myself, regardless of my competency levels. It was a big mistake and a huge waste of valuable time. Weigh up that opportunity cost!

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5. How has working with Harvest Accounting and using Xero impacted your business / life?

This ties nicely into your previous two questions! They have always been there to lean on for advice and solutions when we have run into difficulties. For example cash flow forecasting. They’ve never tried to sell us a product or service we don't need. 

We very quickly realised that our accounting should not be done in house, although I was tempted to try (big mistake!) Some folks chuckle when I tell them this, but the best part of working with Harvest is I can completely forget about accounting, and sometimes I forget they are there working behind the scenes. it’s really seamless to hand this over to them. 

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The best part of working with Harvest is I can completely forget about accounting, and sometimes I forget they are there working behind the scenes.

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6. Shameless plug for your business:

Visit us online at www.ergobetter.co and start your journey to sustainable living the way we did and pick up a Stasher bag. Use it for everything from snacks to stationary to cosmetics, or packing for travel. 

If you don’t find it incredibly useful and a super simple way to reduce single use plastics at home, drop us an email and we’ll give you your money back. Seriously! That’s how much we stand by our much loved products.