Reinventing Toothpaste
I have a friend, Howard Kaufman, who has done what all true entrepreneurs do. He saw a problem that needed fixing and he started a company to fix it. The problem he saw was that some of the ingredients in toothpaste were unsafe, especially for children. Howard did a bunch of reverse engineering and research and discovered that it was possible to produce toothpaste without those toxic and unnatural ingredients. Today he sells toothpaste that isn’t in a tube and doesn’t have sugar and is as healthy for you as anything made in the chemistry lab can be. It’s a pretty cool toothpaste, and I like it. The name of his company is ORL get it? I use a flavor called mint cinnamon. ORL feels like progress to me. (It also offers a bamboo toothbrush. And a mouthwash.)
And no, I have no financial interest here.
The first toothpaste is said to have been created in 1824 by a Dr. Peabody, who combined soap with dental paste. In the 1850s, John Harris added chalk as an ingredient to get closer to toothpaste as we know it. This stuff came in a jar, until some dentist named Dr. Washington Sheffield, who believed it was unsanitary for multiple people to use the same jar of toothpaste, convinced Colgate to put it in a tube.
Dr. Sheffield was inspired by his son Lucius’ visits to Paris, where they both learned that the tubes used to hold paints could be used to create tubes of…
