Salt-Free Water Softener: AQON PURE’s Founder Playbook
- Jörn Menninger
- Sep 25, 2025
- 33 min read
Updated: 21 hours ago
What Is This About?
AQON PURE's founder shares the playbook for building a salt-free water softener company. The startup's approach eliminates the environmental downsides of traditional salt-based systems while delivering effective limescale protection — a growing market as EU regulations tighten on water treatment chemicals.
Introduction
AQON PURE's founders share their playbook for building a salt-free water softener company in the European market. This detailed interview covers the technical development journey, regulatory navigation, go-to-market strategy, and the operational challenges of bringing a hardware product from prototype to commercial scale in the competitive home technology sector.
Executive Summary
AQON PURE's founders share their complete playbook for building a salt-free water softener company in the European market. The journey from prototype to commercial product required navigating complex EU product certification, building a dealer network, and educating consumers about a category most don't know exists. Key challenges included competing against established salt-based incumbents with larger marketing budgets and overcoming skepticism about salt-free effectiveness. The interview reveals specific go-to-market decisions that determined commercial traction.
Discover how AQON PURE turned a family business into a climate-positive cleantech scaleup with salt-free water softeners, disciplined growth, and a new D2C installer network.
This founder interview is part of our ongoing coverage of Scaleup Founder Interviews from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
🚀 Management Summary
In this episode of Startuprad.io, host Jörn "Joe" Menninger sits down with the founder of Salt to explore how this DACH-based startup is tackling real market challenges. From early-stage hustle to scaling strategy, this founder interview dives deep into what it takes to build a startup in the German-speaking ecosystem.
Hard water is more than an inconvenience. Limescale builds up in appliances, drives up energy costs, and shortens the life of heating systems. The traditional fix—salt-based water softeners—comes with its own hidden cost: chloride discharge into rivers and lakes, raising environmental alarms across Europe.
Enter AQON PURE, a German cleantech startup that redefined the category with a salt-free water softener. Instead of adding salt, their solution prevents limescale buildup, helping homes save energy and protect waterways.
In this deep dive, we explore how founders Maximilian and his brother scaled AQON PURE from a family business into a recognized FT1000 growth company. By rejecting the wholesaler-led model and building a D2C + installer partner network, they bootstrapped a hard-to-scale hardware company into European expansion—without VC funding.
This blog answers the question: “How can you scale a cleantech hardware startup in Europe without venture capital?”
📚 Table of Contents
Why Salt-Free Water Softeners Matter
The Problem with Salt Softeners
How AQON PURE Prevents Limescale and Saves Energy
From Family Business to Greentech Startup
D2C + Installer Model: A Hardware Growth Hack
Bootstrapped Scaling vs. VC Money
Expansion into Spain and Poland
Media Flywheel: FT1000 and Schwarzenegger Summit
Key Takeaways
Closing: Where to Go Next
🚀 Meet Our Sponsor
💡 Why Salt-Free Water Softeners Matter
Salt-free water softeners prevent limescale without releasing chlorides, saving energy and protecting rivers. They’re a climate-positive alternative to salt-based softeners.
Across Europe, millions of households rely on salt softeners to deal with hard water. But chloride-laden wastewater has been flagged as a contributor to rising salinity levels in rivers like the Oder. AQON PURE’s salt-free solution addresses limescale buildup while eliminating chloride discharge, making it both a consumer and climate win.
The Problem with Salt Softeners
Salt softeners discharge chloride brine into wastewater, which can damage ecosystems and increase municipal treatment costs.
Cities like Los Angeles and German municipalities have debated or even banned traditional ion-exchange softeners due to chloride discharge. The brine not only threatens biodiversity but also raises costs for water treatment plants. AQON PURE’s founders saw a growing regulatory trend against salt-based systems—a perfect opening for salt-free alternatives.
How AQON PURE Prevents Limescale and Saves Energy
Salt-free systems alter water chemistry to prevent limescale deposits, improving heating efficiency and lowering energy bills.
Research shows that just 1 mm of limescale can increase energy use in water heaters by 10–15%. By preventing scale buildup, AQON PURE systems reduce appliance strain and extend lifespans. For consumers, this means smaller energy bills; for the climate, it means less wasted electricity and gas.
From Family Business to Greentech Startup
AQON PURE transformed from an industrial water-treatment supplier into a consumer-facing startup brand.
Founded as part of a family-run water treatment business, AQON PURE repositioned itself as a consumer startup. Instead of selling through industry wholesalers, they focused on branding, storytelling, and direct customer engagement—hallmarks of modern D2C startups. This hybrid identity—family stability meets startup speed—gave them credibility with both plumbers and consumers.
D2C + Installer Model: A Hardware Growth Hack
AQON PURE built a certified installer network, bypassing wholesalers, and scaling from 100 to 400 partners.
Traditional hardware relies on wholesalers and trade shops to reach customers. AQON PURE’s pivot was radical: sell directly online while building a nationwide installer partner network. Plumbers who once resisted salt-free solutions now had certification, training, and customer leads. This two-sided network unlocked rapid growth and defensibility against copycats.
Bootstrapped Scaling vs. VC Money
AQON PURE scaled through disciplined bootstrapping, avoiding VC pressure and prioritizing quality.
Unlike many hardware startups that burn through venture capital, AQON PURE remained bootstrapped. This forced the team to grow carefully—ensuring stock availability, installer capacity, and complaint rates below 3%. Their story counters the “growth at all costs” narrative: in hardware, sustainability and quality often beat hypergrowth.
Expansion into Spain and Poland
AQON PURE is methodically expanding into Spain and Poland, prioritizing installer readiness and cultural adaptation.
After winning recognition in Germany and Austria, AQON PURE’s next step was EU growth. Spain and Poland offered ideal testbeds: large hard-water regions, rising demand for sustainable home tech, and a manageable installer base. Rather than “blitzscaling,” they emphasized localized installer recruitment and market education—ensuring longevity over speed.the full management team to align cultural expectations. Don’t repeat it.
Media Flywheel: FT1000 and Schwarzenegger Summit
FT1000 recognition and the Schwarzenegger Climate Summit boosted AQON PURE’s legitimacy and awareness.
Credibility fuels cleantech adoption. When AQON PURE appeared in the Financial Times FT1000 ranking and on stage at the Austrian World Summit with Arnold Schwarzenegger, it signaled legitimacy. This media flywheel—awards, PR, customer trust—created a growth loop that money alone couldn’t buy.
Key Takeaways
Salt-free water softeners prevent limescale and chloride discharge.
Bootstrapped growth can scale hardware—if paired with discipline.
Bypassing wholesalers via D2C + installers is a repeatable model.
Energy efficiency gains create dual savings: consumer + climate.
Expansion into Spain and Poland reflects quality-first scaling.
Atomic Answer
Founder Quote Box
“We wasted 18 months chasing wholesalers—until D2C changed everything.” — Maximilian Wilk, AQON PURE
This quote illustrates why hardware founders must rethink legacy distribution. AQON PURE’s pivot is a case study in building new routes to market when incumbents resist.
Market Lens
Hardware is back—but with a climate twist. Rising EU regulations on chloride discharge, the heating law in Germany, and consumer demand for energy savings create a perfect storm. AQON PURE’s model could be replicated across other home-efficiency verticals: HVAC, solar, or heat pumps.
Pro Tip
If you’re scaling hardware in Europe, treat installer networks as your “channel.” Just as SaaS founders build partner ecosystems, hardware founders should recruit, certify, and incentivize installers as their distribution engine.
Stat Spotlight
1 mm of limescale = +10–15% energy use in hot water systems.
400 certified installers in AQON PURE’s network.
<3% complaint rate despite scaling hardware across Germany.
🧵 Further Reading
🚪 Connect with Us
Partner with us: partnerships@startuprad.io
Subscribe: https://linktr.ee/startupradio
Feedback: https://forms.gle/SrcGUpycu26fvMFE9
Follow Joe on LinkedIn: Jörn Menninger
Relationship Map
Jörn "Joe" Menninger → Host of → Startuprad.io
Frequently Asked Questions
What is this article about: Salt-Free Water Softener: AQON PURE’s Founder Playbook?
AQON PURE's founder shares the playbook for building a salt-free water softener company. The startup's approach eliminates the environmental downsides of traditional salt-based systems while delivering effective limescale protection — a growing market as EU regulations tighten on water treatment chemicals.
What are the main takeaways from this discussion?
AQON PURE's founders share their playbook for building a salt-free water softener company in the European market. This detailed interview covers the technical development journey, regulatory navigation, go-to-market strategy, and the operational challenges of bringing a hardware product from prototype to commercial scale in the competitive home technology sector.
How does this topic connect to the broader startup ecosystem?
AQON PURE's founders share their complete playbook for building a salt-free water softener company in the European market. The journey from prototype to commercial product required navigating complex EU product certification, building a dealer network, and educating consumers about a category most don't know exists. Key challenges included competing against established salt-based incumbents with larger marketing budgets and overcoming skepticism about salt-free effectiveness. The interview revea
About the Host
Joern "Joe" Menninger is the host of the Startuprad.io podcast and covers founders, investors, and policy developments across the DACH startup ecosystem. Through more than 1,300 interviews and nearly a decade of reporting, he documents the evolution of the European startup landscape. Follow Joern on LinkedIn.
Support Startuprad.io
This founder story was produced by Startuprad.io, the leading independent podcast covering the German and European startup ecosystem. If you enjoyed learning how AQON PURE scaled without VC funding, subscribe to our podcast on Spotify or Apple Podcasts and leave a review. Your support helps us bring more founder stories to light.
Automated Transcript
1 What if I told you there's a German greentech startup 2 that's disrupting a hundred year old water treatment industry, 3 growing triple digits every year and has 4 even caught the attention of Arnold Schwarzenegger? Today 5 we're diving into the story of Akwan Poor, the 6 salt free water softener that's saving energy, protecting 7 the environment and scaling fast across Europe. If you care 8 about sustainability, cleantech hardware and and startup growth 9 strategies, this episode will change the way you think about 10 water and how startups can dominate overlooked 11 markets. 12 Welcome to startup Rad IO, 13 your podcast and YouTube blog covering the German 14 startup scene with news, interviews and 15 live events. 16 Hello and welcome everybody. Welcome back to Startup Rate IO, your 17 deep dive podcast into the world of startups and technology. 18 Today we're talking about a startup that is shaking up
19 an overlooked yet vital sector. Water treatment and 20 clean technology. My guest is Maximilian Wilk. 21 Hey, welcome. Thank you very much for your invitation, Jan. 22 My pleasure. You are the co founder and COO of Akwanpur, 23 one of Europe's fastest growing green tech startups. 24 Akwanpur's salt free water treatment systems 25 are helping thousands of households and businesses to 26 reduce lime scale, cut energy costs and protect the environment. 27 All while scaling triple digit revenue growth in a legacy 28 industry. We'll unpack how Maximilian and his brother turned 29 their family business roots into a sustainable hardware 30 startup, how they caught the the mention of Arnold Schwarzenegger himself, 31 and why water might be the next big clean 32 tech frontier after energy. This is going to be an inspiring 33 one for founders, investors and anyone passionate about sustainability 34
and disruption. Maximilian, let us 35 dive in with some core questions. 36 You guys. Aquapor are actually family business that 37 turned into green tech startup. You co founded Akron Poor 38 with the Fadas water solutions company. Can you walk us 39 through that transition from like a family owned 40 industrial supplier to a hardware startup tackling household 41 water treatment? Sure. 42 So we actually have gone through a very 43 different story compared to many other startups. As you said, we are 44 not a freshly founded startup from scratch. 45 We took our father's business and 46 transformed it in some kind of a startup or we call it 47 the family startup. The reason behind our history is 48 that our father already started many, many years ago, before 49 aconpure to work in the water treatment industry. So he had a 50 very, very deep and broad knowledge about different branches,
51 about different technologies and 52 what's the need in different sectors. 53 So the thing was back then in 54 2016 or 2017, he was, as you said, focusing on 55 industrial solutions. He was cleaning water 56 in the metal industry, for example, 57 cleaning washing processes, cleaning the Water of 58 washing processes and trying to 59 regain the washing detergents, for example, or 60 save oil and fats from waters and 61 put it back into the different processes and try to 62 clean the wastewater as much as possible. That 63 you have a very, very low level of substances 64 in your wastewater. And limescale 65 always has been, let's say, a 66 very, very tiny part of these different technologies, 67 of these industrial water treatment technologies. But it was 68 an important part. And 69 I think we saw the chance in 2017
70 when we said together with our father that we can actually 71 use his knowledge instead of just founding a company 72 from scratch. So we 73 tried to convince him that our 74 solution to focus on private households 75 is a more suitable solution for my brother 76 and me because we have to lead the company in the 77 future. Our father was already, I think he was 65 78 years old during that time. So he was looking into 79 retirement and he was, yeah, 80 he already knew that he couldn't do this forever. 81 So my brother and me were convincing him, okay, we 82 actually, we would do it, we would like to do it a bit different. 83 And the problem was to shift a 84 small family business which is focusing on just 85 a hand of customers, 86 industrial customers, to thousands of private households of
87 private customers that you have to change the whole 88 structure of the company. So one example, our 89 father didn't even have a modern 90 CRM system, an IT based CRM system 91 where you have an overlook about all the customers. 92 Our father didn't use many 93 sources for marketing like online marketing, Google Ads, 94 affiliate marketing, whatever. He didn't use none of them. 95 He didn't even do a lot of offline marketing. He was one of 96 these like vitamin C businesses that he knew a lot of 97 people in the market because of his experience. So 98 he knew how to contact people, who to contact 99 them, who to contact and what are the 100 problems in the current situations today we would say 101 it's network sales. Exactly, exactly. It's network 102 sales. And at the beginning it was 103
quite difficult to tell him what kind of 104 marketing strategies we were focusing on, what it 105 we need. And yeah, 106 for example, I remember the first discussion in 2018 where 107 I was asking him for can I have a thousand 108 euros to invest in Google Ads? And he said to me, 109 well, I never invested a single euro in Google Ads or 110 somewhere else. But okay, after a couple 111 of days I had the goal. So 112 I tried to spend them as wisely as possible. And I made 113 from a thousand euros, seven to eight thousand euros with two 114 months. So meaning return on your ad 115 spending. Exactly, exactly. The return on the ads was from 116 the multiple was seven to eight times, which was very good 117 for us in this situation. So it was not only
118 that you have to convince your father during that time, 119 it's also very beneficial to show him the results 120 very, very fast, that you are possibly on 121 the right track. I see. 122 And so basically you set up this company next to 123 the existing company. Exactly. One of the 124 interesting pieces, because I do get a lot of pitches, 125 we accept less than 1% of the incoming pitches. 126 What caught my eye was you talked about 127 Arnold Schwarzenegger. You first encountered him in 128 2009 water 129 softener band while writing your master thesis in Silicon Valley. 130 How did that moment spark the idea for Arkwan Poor 131 and shaped your mission driven approach to sustainability? 132 I think that was a great help. So I was writing my 133 master thesis in the Silicon Valley from 2016 to the
134 beginning of 2017 and I was living together with, 135 with some local students of the Stanford University. 136 And they were also very interested in 137 entrepreneurship, founding their own companies, doing their own 138 businesses. And during a dinner they were asking, hey 139 Max, what are you doing beside your studies, beside writing your 140 master thesis? And I told them, well, my father has a 141 small company which is focusing on water treatment, on industrial 142 water treatment during that times. And so we 143 were talking about filtration and all that stuff. One guy suddenly 144 said, actually, do you know, we some kind have of 145 weak, some kind have of a saying here which says, 146 Arnold has terminated the salt based water 147 softener and that's based on a law 148 which bans iron exchangers. So 149 in the first moment I thought it was, or it might be
150 a joke because it sounded very different to what people 151 used in Germany to the iron exchanger. The salt based water 152 softener is very common technology you are using when 153 you have hot water. So at the first moment my reaction was, 154 okay, oh, it sounds interesting. But I try, 155 I try to be a bit, let's say serious because 156 I didn't know in that moment that 157 how truth, how, how true it was what that 158 guy was saying. So after the conversation, after the dinner, I went 159 online, I googled it and I could find this law signed 160 in 2009 by Arnold Schwarzenegger, which 161 enabled local authorities to ban the salt based water 162 softeners when the level of chloride in lakes and 163 rivers is too high. Because the wastewater of these 164 systems of the salt based water softeners, they are
165 increasing the chloride levels because as you know, salt 166 consists of sodium chloride and the chloride cannot be, 167 cannot get filtered out by sewage water treatment plants. So 168 they get into rivers and lakes. So it 169 was some kind of an Eye opening moment 170 when someone was telling me about this law. And 171 the more interesting fact was Arnold Schwarzenegger signed this law. 172 So I thought, okay, if, if there is a law in 173 California, whether it's signed by Arnold Schwarzenegger or 174 whoever else, there must be a serious 175 topic about this kind of salty 176 wastewater, about this threat of high chloride levels. 177 So I just called my father the next day and said, 178 hey, have you heard about this kind of environmental 179 issues with salt based water softeners? And he said, yes, 180 it's true. For example, a one family household
181 uses about 100 kg of salt every year, 182 which gets then into rivers and lakes. So we are talking 183 about probably hundreds of thousand tons 184 alone in Germany who get into rivers 185 and lakes every year. And the salt in there 186 makes it, makes it damaging, makes it difficult for 187 the local environment. Plus, my understanding 188 is the water softener is mostly to 189 reduce lime scale, which then makes difficulties with all the 190 pipes and all the machines the water go through because it 191 leaves those white residues. Yes, it's exactly, it's 192 two sides of the same metal. So on the one hand, 193 water softeners with salt are used to solve the 194 problems caused by hard water. Hard water means you have a lot of 195 limescale in the water, which consists of mainly 196 calcium and magnesia. And hard water,
197 as you said, causes limescale deposits in 198 pipes, in machines like washing 199 machines, dishwashing machines, on your shower head, 200 on faucets, on any surfaces. And on the one hand 201 you can clean your surface, you can descale like the kettle in the 202 kitchen. But after a while, for example 203 pipes, they start to clog and you have to descale them 204 or you have to renew them, which means a lot of cost. And 205 furthermore, every millimeter of limescale increases 206 or decreases the energy efficiency because it's like an 207 isolating surface. The lim scale deposits, every millimeter 208 increases this energy inefficiency. So 209 you need more energy to get to the same level of hot water. 210 So on the one hand, yes, salt 211 based water softeners is reducing these kind of problems because 212 the, the limescale is pulled out of the water and
213 exchanged against the sodium of the, of the salt. 214 However, the chloride is flushed into the 215 wastewater which then gets into rivers and lakes. 216 And one very famous example is the, the 217 crisis of the high amount of salty 218 wastewater which got into the river Oder in 219 2022 or 2023. I just don't remember the exact 220 year. But it's some, some years ago and 221 there was high, high levels and amounts of 222 salty wastewater flushed 223 into the into the Oder river. And as you could see, 224 some, let's say plants, they start to grow 225 like a certain algae was growing. But 226 due to this growth of the algae, many fishes 227 died. So high levels of chloride, they 228 heavily affect ecosystems 229 mostly at a certain level. Plants have problems to grow, 230 animals have problems to live and certain levels of
231 chloride. But what research has found out that 232 high levels of chloride. Yeah. Damage 233 ecosystems and that the current, let's say law, 234 which regulates the limit of chloride, which is allowed 235 to be in rivers and lakes, are not low 236 enough to actually protect, for example. 237 Yeah. Fishes or plants. So we have a 238 serious problem, problem with salt. Salt is 239 globally an increasing threat to 240 freshwater systems. So it's not only the salt based 241 weights, waste salt based salt, salt based 242 water softeners who are 243 creating this problem. We, we have a serious problem 244 overall with the increasing salt levels in 245 freshwater systems. That already takes 246 care of my next question because I was wondering how you discovered this 247 gap and that's basically already the story from 248 our audience. I would be curious, what would you do
249 differently if you could go back to 2017? 250 What's the one decision you change in 251 your startup scaling journey? Let's talk a little bit 252 about disruption and scaling as a hardware startup, because you're 253 basically a hardware startup. Hardware is notoriously 254 hard. Right. Especially in scaling. What were the 255 biggest go to market challenges you faced during a physical 256 product to market and how did you overcome them? 257 I think it connects very well to the question before, what 258 would you do different? And the plumbing 259 industry is a very conservative industry. And a normal 260 sales strategy as a manufacturer of water treatment systems would be 261 that you sell to a wholesaler, the wholesaler sells to a local 262 plumber and the local plumber then sells to the 263 customer. So you have a multi level or 264
multi tier sales process. 265 And the first one and a half years from 2017 266 on, we tried to go to the same sales funnel. We 267 were cold calling, for example, wholesalers, we were 268 visiting them, we trained, really tried to get into their 269 catalogs, into their stocks, 270 which was very hard because our, our product is cheaper and it 271 doesn't need any, doesn't create any 272 reoccurring revenue for let's say salt or 273 maintenance. And we then tried to go one 274 step ahead. We tried to reach out to local plumbers and it was 275 the same. Our product, depending on which manufacturer 276 look at, is depending on the size of the product, 277 nearly half as cheap as a normal salt based water 278 softener or even cheaper. And as I said, no 279 reoccurring revenue for maintenance or Salt.
280 And so plumbers also didn't show a lot of interest. 281 Interest. And we lost one and a half years 282 focusing of this established sales 283 channel. So after one and 284 a half years, we did some kind of a recap where we 285 were talking about, okay, what can we do better? What did 286 work well? And we saw we had a very small website during 287 that time, but every time a customer went to that page 288 and did an inquiry via the website, 289 they could contact us. We had not a 290 professional sales hotline, but many people called us and 291 asked for some consultancy and we talked to them how it works, how it 292 would be installed, and people 293 started buying it from us directly. So we thought, 294 okay, if no wholesaler wants to buy it, if not a
295 plumber wants to buy it, we can sell it directly to the customer, 296 which has even the advantage that we are not giving away any margin. 297 And one of these customers also was asking 298 us, can you also do the installation of the product? 299 And as a startup you say, very brave, yes, of course we can. 300 But we didn't have any install and 301 any plumber at hand to install the product before, but we had 302 many contacts from our sales activities the 303 month before. So we called some of them and we said, hey, 304 we already have a customer who just bought the product. Would you do the 305 installation? Ten of them said, no, not interested. It's my 306 customer, by the way. And one said, yeah, I 307 can do the installation. Just send me a photo of the
308 pipes and the material. And we asked the customer then, 309 can you send us a picture? Can you send us the material? And he 310 sends us the pictures and we forwarded it to the plumber and he said, yeah, 311 I can do the installation next week. It's all done, just give me the number, 312 I make the call and I make the appointment. And it worked 313 very well. So 314 after one and a half years of disappointments and many hurdles, 315 we tried to learn much faster, which was, okay, 316 what's the customer? The customer is not the plumber, it's not the 317 wholesaler, it's the end customer. And how can we 318 also offer or streamline the whole process? We just offer 319 the installation as well by asking for a simple picture 320 which you can take from your smartphone and the material
321 and integrated it on the website to 322 explain the whole process very clearly to the, to the 323 customer. And that was then the biggest, 324 the biggest step we had to take as a hardware startup. So 325 it's not like a software startup where you press a button and the customer 326 can use it. You need to send the product to, 327 to the, to the customer. So we had to establish some kind 328 of a logistics process which was still okay, manageable. 329 But the much more difficult process was to 330 find hundreds of plumbers in Germany which would 331 follow or which would be interested in our 332 fully integrated sales funnel from selling the 333 product, from offering the installation, to actually install 334 the product. And that took another one and a half years to find 335 these plumbers which are interested in it and which
336 are now very well aware of the advantages because it 337 saves them a lot of time and also a lot of, 338 let's say, stuff, because stuff in the 339 plumbing industry is very rare. So with us they save, 340 let's say 80% of time for one installation work. 341 And it was, let's say one and a half years 342 of doing many calls and reaching out to many 343 plumbers to set up this network of installation partners. 344 That would be my next question. Because you grew your partner network 345 of certified partners from 100 to 400 plumbers in 346 five years. What's the playbook for building such a strong 347 disruption and install the network in a fragmented market? 348 The playbook consists of a lot of hard work. So 349 at the first moment, it's all about reaching out to 350 them, calling them,
351 dealing with, let's say 80% of well, I'm not 352 interested, thank you very much. But 353 also finding the right way of communication when you contact 354 them. And it was not about, hey, we have the latest 355 technology of limescale treatment here. We have, which 356 turned out to a fully new sales pitch. It 357 was like we have a fully, 358 say turnkey contract. Not a contract, a 359 turnkey customer for you. You just have 360 to call them. You just have to make the appointment. You can 361 calculate your work to us, what you actually do. 362 It's not like 363 a fixed sales price we are offering you. 364 You can calculate your work as you actually do. 365 And you have then 366 also afterwards a customer who can call you if the 367 customer needs, for example, the maintenance of a heating system, a new
368 bathroom, a new heating system at all. So they 369 saw, okay, from a paid work can 370 create. Can there can be created many, many more opportunities 371 for my business. And the plumber has a very, very easy 372 work and a very, very profitable way to 373 customers. So basically they getting paid 374 for generating a lead, a new business contract. Okay, 375 exactly, exactly, exactly. That was our reach out 376 after half a year to our plumbers who are working with us. 377 But yeah, it was just like 378 I said, a lot of hard work in little, little 379 small steps, reaching out as many plumbers as possible 380 with the right words. I see. 381 I was wondering, how did you educate your customers 382 on why limescale prevention matters. I mean 383 everybody who had to redo the pipes in the bathroom
384 or the washing machine or 385 dishwasher broke down due to limescale nodas. But 386 how did you educate your customers there? Especially when 387 competitors are pushing like the traditional salt based system. 388 What we found out that our customers in 389 our industry, they are really looking for a lot of information. 390 Of course it has to be understandable, 391 very easily understandable. But they are really 392 willing to learn more about what you are publishing, for 393 example on your website. So when they are on your website and 394 you know, okay, are they there is this disadvantage of energy 395 efficiency. You have to show them how this kind 396 of energy efficiency problem is solved 397 by our product. And of course to make it very, 398 very clear, also for very critical customers, you have to 399 explain it with a lot of serious sources. And you're not
400 talking about, I'm referring to decented web pages. You are probably 401 willing to publish or refer to a lot of 402 journal articles, scientific journal articles that 403 customers can even dig deeper. And 404 then you reach at least the customers who are already searching for 405 these kind of products. But we also 406 then saw, okay, there is the even bigger part 407 of, let's say, potential customers in Germany, which are 408 millions, millions of house owners. We have 19 409 million buildings, residential buildings in Germany. 410 They are not aware of the possibilities that there are salt based 411 water softeners or even our technology. So we had to 412 create some kind of awareness. And what we saw that 413 during that time the topic of limescale treatment was 414 very rare in the press, in public 415 media, like big newspapers, magazines,
416 hardly no one has ever written about limescale 417 treatment, about water treatment, except very, very 418 focused branch magazines for 419 plumbers. So we tried to sum up 420 the whole knowledge about these problems about energy 421 efficiency. What does limescale do with your pipes? 422 And what actually is the current solution? The lime, the salt 423 based water softener. And what is the problem? We added the 424 story of Arnold Schwarzenegger that he has signed in 425 2009, the law in Californ. And then we reached 426 out to the newspapers. And then in 2021, I remember 427 there was the first big newspaper article and the Sutdeutsche 428 Zeitung. And from that 429 beginning the topic was much clearer to a broader 430 audience. It was not only the interested people or the people 431 who are working in the plumbing industry, but you could
432 really see that the topic is now 433 getting more and more understandable for a broader 434 audience. And if you can explain it very, 435 very clearly, then you 436 could see that they are also, let's say Getting 437 doing an inquiry on our website and yeah, finally buying the 438 product. I see. Last, 439 last question before our our little ad break. 440 With triple digit growth rates and seven figure 441 revenues, how do you balance this operational scaling with 442 maintaining a product quality and a very low 2 to 3% 443 complaint rate? I think 444 the most important sentence you always have to 445 remember as a hardware startup is grow slower than 446 you actually want to because 447 as you say, the product has to be built. You have to have the product 448 in stock. You have to have the product in the right quality in stock.
449 And in our case you need to have the installation network that 450 once the product is sent to the customer, the 451 plumber calls the customer and makes 452 the appointment for the installation and then fulfills the installation. 453 So there are many, many more steps to be aware of 454 compared to a software startup. And the 455 easiest way is to solve 456 the danger of, 457 let's say 458 demanding more from your company than it actually can do. 459 Is being a bit on the brake and 460 always looking, checking every month, what's the stock level? Is 461 the quality good? How is the appointment rate of the 462 plumbers, Is the installation work good? And 463 you have to be very, very close to your final customer and checking 464 internally to your, to your staff, to our 465 salespeople, to our technical engineers who are planning the installations.
466 What do customers say? Is there other appointments still on 467 time? And if you are 468 getting the, not the feeling, but if you can see that 469 it's taking too long for the installation or something happens to 470 the return rate, you really have to stop. You 471 have to turn down, let's say the, the marketing budget. 472 You have to reduce the amounts of leads you're 473 getting every month. And if you see that it's 474 all stable, the return rate is 475 stable, then you can start to grow again. But 476 it's always a constant process of checking what 477 can your organization do? And how 478 happy are customers? And we implemented for example, 479 a call one week after the installation. How happy I was the product. 480 How happy are you with the, with the plumber, for example? And
481 these inputs are used for our monitoring 482 still. They are still used for our monitoring. And 483 then we can see, okay, is there still room for, for more growth? 484 I see. Guys, we will be back 485 after short ad break. 486 Guys, welcome back after our short ad break with a little 487 bit more talking about sustain market awareness, 488 celebrity and media impact and future growth and 489 European expansion plans. 490 Max Melvin Water scarcity and pollution are becoming bigger 491 issues globally. Yet customer awareness is still 492 low compared to for example, mobility or energy transitions. 493 How do you shift public perception and make water the 494 Next big sustainability topic. 495 That's a very good point. Germany is in the 496 European Union, one of the countries with the, 497 with the worst surface water qualities. 498 We, I think we are on
499 16th place of 20. 500 And furthermore, Germany is one of the countries with the 501 highest rate, with the highest loss 502 of water, of fresh 503 water. So the problem has already 504 become very, very real, as you say. 505 However, I would admit that it's not yet such a big 506 topic compared to mobility or 507 energy. I think 508 many, many cases have shown that 509 many topics become just an important or big 510 topic in media if it's nearly already too late. 511 Too late. Let's say for example, during after Ukraine, the 512 beginning of the Ukraine war, the energy prices 513 increased dramatically and then all the people started to invest in, 514 let's say solar panels and getting their own solar system 515 to reduce energy costs. And 516 of course solar technology has been around many, many years
517 before, which could have been a great solution against 518 making us more independent from for example gas. 519 However, not many people were interested in it and as you 520 can see now with the water we can already see the 521 lakes and rivers are getting in a worse and worse 522 shape and we have a reduction of fresh 523 water, a loss of fresh water in Germany. 524 So as a founder I would 525 avoid to shout out all these 526 worst case scenario messages. Okay, we are 527 focused or we are steering ahead into a water crisis. 528 We have within 30 years we won't have any 529 drinking water left or something like this. It's on 530 the one hand, of course, in Germany it's not credible at the moment and 531 I think 532 it's not the right way to work with these kind worst
533 case scenarios. You have to find a moderate 534 way, a clear way and a serious 535 way to make it understandable for customers what is going on, 536 what is happening with our water supply? And it's not something 537 which will happen from this year to next year. 538 It's something which probably takes five to ten years to 539 reach. A shift from water is here, 540 we have no problem with water to okay, we have to take care. 541 We have to seriously take care with our water. And 542 so we are seeing this as a long term project. And this 543 mostly goes not through, let's say 544 online marketing or website or something. It's 545 getting, getting started a discussion, a 546 conversation about our waters. This could mean getting started a 547 conversation in newspapers, in media, in tv, 548 within the conversation of people itself.
549 That's the main goal that you're 550 showing and making it understandable that you have to take care of 551 this. But it's definitely a term 552 transition before it takes 553 serious action. And I'm also not a fan of 554 going to into politics and saying we need a law which now, 555 yeah, focuses on also forbidding the salt based water 556 softeners, for example, like Arnold Schwarzenegger did in California. We also 557 have seen with the heating law in Germany, which was 558 mainly forcing or trying to force people investing in 559 heating pumps, that it exactly led to the opposite. People 560 were running into cheap gas powered heating 561 systems before the law came into 562 place and then the heating pump market 563 broke together. So creating a 564 sustainable demand goes hand in hand with a 565 sustainable and serious understanding why these technologies are
566 important. I see 567 we already covered quite a lot of the questions 568 that I would have here for you, how they reduce energy 569 consumption. And we already talked about the German 570 heating law. That is 571 something we already covered. So let's go to the next questions and 572 talk a little bit. The celebrity and media impact because 573 Arnold Schwarzenegger, the governator, became one of your supporters. 574 How did the relationship develop from the FT1000 575 recognition to being invited to his climate conference? 576 It's also a long way until 577 we, we got in contact with him. So we even start, we even 578 tried once to reach out to him directly before we 579 got this award. I don't know the 580 exact year, but we reached 581 out to him, to his organizations with some very personal 582 letters, also with some of the newspaper articles which
583 were published and which were writing about his 584 law in 2009. And yeah, there 585 was no reaction, but 586 maybe his organizations, 587 they were like saving this information. When we 588 reached out and when we got 589 nominated for this FT1000 award, 590 one of the persons which we reached out to the time before 591 made contact to us and said, hey, I 592 saw you got this award. Okay. It's a very important 593 topic. We also see the connection to the law of Mr. 594 Schwarzenegger. Would you be willing to tell us 595 more about what you're doing? And then 596 we first had a video call with 597 one of his employees from the 598 Schwarzenegger Institute from California. 599 And after the call we had to send some 600 documentation to him. And a couple of weeks 601 later we got invited to Arnold Schwarzenegger's office
602 in California, in Los Angeles or Santa Monica. 603 But then we also didn't meet him. We met, 604 let's say, the director of the Schwarzenegger Institute in Santa 605 Monica. And then we had another, I wouldn't say it, it was a check. But 606 of course they, they took, they really took a closer look before 607 we could meet him. And we were having, let's say, a 608 deep conversation of what we are doing. How's the technology working? 609 Let's, they really wanted to see, okay, that's some serious 610 thing here. And the good thing was we have already been, I think it 611 was 2024 when we, when we went to the office. 612 So we have, we had already a track record of 613 six years on the market, seven years on the market. 614 And then we were invited the first time to
615 the Austrian World Summit in Vienna the next 616 year. And so we met Mr. 617 Schwarzenegger himself. 618 And so also again, 619 it's not something which happened overnight. It was like you really had to show 620 that you're a serious player, that you're on, not like a company which 621 is here the one day and the next day it's gone. And they 622 wanted to see that you are really are standing 623 behind your technology, behind the solution you're offering. 624 And they want to see how clearly can you communicate 625 and prove what you are, you are saying. 626 And I think after one year 627 later, we then were allowed to speak at the Austrian World Summit 628 as one of the startups who are allowed to present their solution. 629 And of course that was a very, very great honor because
630 we are, we are also presenting a work 631 which Arnold started to trigger in California 632 more than 15 years ago and now swapped over 633 to, to the European market. And 634 I would say, of course it's not some, 635 not something that they're looking for any startup to 636 be on the stage. It has to show, okay, the relevance 637 over, if possible, a certain period 638 of time. You talked about 639 being on this, Schwarzenegger's climate summit. How was it to 640 stand on the stage as a speaker? I think it's 641 the time before the standing on 642 the stage is more demanding than actually being on 643 the stage. The good thing about these conferences is that 644 you're really, really thinking about what would you like 645 to say, what is your message? What, what, what do you want to
646 communicate? And that takes several days 647 or weeks until you're very clear about 648 what do I want to say. And these, let's 649 say 15, 20 minutes you're on stage, then it's like you try to 650 deliver this message on point. 651 And of course in this case it was a great honor because 652 I could see Arnold Schwarzenegger was sitting in the first row so he could 653 again listen to our story while telling the story to thousands of 654 other people. Which makes it also 655 like achieving a very, very big goal, 656 starting the company 2017, eight years later, 657 standing on the stage, telling about the history, telling about 658 the story, and telling what you are doing to 659 one of the greatest heroes of also my personal career, but 660 also to a person who means 661 who is like a very
662 the climate action hero, as Arnold always says to many 663 other people in the world. And that's also something which 664 definitely shaped our brand recognition, our credibility 665 that we could have this slot on on stage and 666 telling about what we are doing. Before we go into future and 667 growth and your European expansion, I was wondering 668 for our audience, what's your boldest prediction? What's your 669 boldest prediction for the future of water tech and sustainability 670 by 2030? Comment down here in the show 671 notes or simply tag us on social media. 672 Now let's talk about future and growth and your European expansion. Here 673 you set a goal to become Europe's market leader in 674 landscape prevention by 2030. What's your roadmap for 675 expanding beyond the dach region? As 676 I said, we are born as a company who walks small
677 steps and I think it's the same here. 678 So we are not starting to enter 679 many other European countries once at a 680 time. We have focused on a soft 681 relaunch last year on all the or 682 many other EU countries and we found out okay, 683 it might be Spain and Poland who might be very interesting 684 for us to enter into the market. So at the moment we start 685 to prepare the website, we start to hire 686 sales teams for these countries and 687 then we will start in a very, very small, 688 let's say scale with a little bit of advertising in 689 these countries. And parallel to that we are starting 690 to build up also our installation network, our network of 691 plumbers. And this also happens in 692 regular or in small steps, regular checks, 693
sitting closely together. How did it go? What are the results? 694 And when we see okay, the sales pitch works, 695 the plumbers are interested in it, we start to get this 696 engine running and do bigger and bigger steps. But it's 697 not the case that we have like a big, big partner who do the installation, 698 big wholesalers or something. We really try to stick to our roots to 699 build up this network from scratch, which has shown as a very 700 stable network because these plumbers are very loyal, they stick 701 to your business and they're very thankful for this kind of 702 cooperation. 703 I see greentech and clean tech 704 investors are increasingly active in hardware because everybody knows 705 hardware is hard. What kind of investor relationships or funding 706 strategies is key for your growth phase, 707 knowing that you are currently bootstrapped.
708 But I would also be curious if you are open to 709 talk to new investors and what do you think about that? 710 We have the 711 in our company we really try to grow 712 with our own money as long as possible. As long 713 we can finance the growth 714 by ourselves. We will always try to 715 go this very specific way because 716 what we have seen, having the control about the 717 company being able to make quick 718 decisions, having as few people sitting 719 on a table for these kind of decision making processes is very 720 important to us. And 721 if we see, for example could be the case in 722 our internationalization process that 723 we need more money than we are earning at the moment, then we would 724 say okay, now we are ready for or
725 we now really see the need, the urge for external 726 investors. But we actually 727 really try to avoid this kind of investment. 728 Although we know, as you say, hardware cases are also very 729 interesting for cleantech investors. Now 730 let's put on your glasses looking into the future. I know forecasts are always 731 difficult, especially concerning the future. That said, if you 732 look five years ahead, how do you see water treatment 733 technology evolving and what role will Akron poor play 734 in building sustainable homes and infrastructure? 735 That's a very interesting question. I 736 have been looking on the water treatment market, 737 especially for residential purposes for 738 the last, let's say 10 years or even longer before I 739 started to work at my father's company. And 740 there are some startups, there are some companies who are 741
offering new technology, new solutions, but compared to other 742 branches like the energy sector, mobility sector, even 743 IT sector, 744 it's very, very small. And 745 I'm a bit skeptical in that case. I'm a bit 746 scared that they might not happening. More 747 movement, more growth. I think there won't 748 be many different or new technologies compared to the 749 debt to compared to today as far as I can see. 750 And of course bringing more 751 movement into this market would maybe also bring the 752 whole water treatment market on the next level for 753 let's say for the public discussion on such technologies and the 754 urge of such technologies. But at the moment I don't see it. 755 So we really try to work 756 in this field as good as we can, as much as we can, 757 as fast as we can. And our
758 hope is because we also 759 don't see a lot of competition in specifically 760 limescale treatment technologies that we are the 761 major supplier of the salt free limescale 762 treatment technology all over the European Union. 763 I see. And the last question for this interview, as 764 it traditional at Startup Radio, we 765 already talked about your openness to new investors. Are you looking for new employees? 766 Yeah, sure. We are regularly looking for new employees, for 767 example, like a sales agent for the Spanish market. 768 But I would be happy to share our 769 website to give you a further look on who 770 we are looking for. We will totally share this 771 career website and only thing I can say Spanish. 772 Maximilian. It was a pleasure talking to you. Thank you very much. Hope to have 773 you back on an update down the road. Thank you very
774 much. Joran. Thank you very much for the invitation. It was very nice talking 775 to you. You. My pleasure. 776 That's all folks. Find more news streams, 777 events and interviews at 778 www.startupradio. 779 remember, sharing is caring. 780 Sam.
Comments