News and Events

14 dec 2009

Pūrleve's Green Innovation Meets Copenhagen

(Click to listen to the interview and view the full article at wuwm.com)

Governor Jim Doyle is jumping into the climate change discussion taking place this week in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Governors and premiers from around the world are speaking at the U.N. Climate Change Conference. Doyle plans to showcase Wisconsin as a leader in clean energy technology.

WUWM environmental reporter Susan Bence met a local entrepreneur who plans to be part of the international movement.

We're in a rented warehouse about 10 miles northwest of Milwaukee, and it's not much warmer inside than out. Yet Todd Muderlak is dressed in shorts and an old high school sweatshirt. A ski cap protects his closely shaven head from the chill.

Muderlak is surrounded by a sea of porcelain urinals.

"Right now we're actually adding a screen to our flange, this metal piece here goes into our waterless urinal," Muderlak says.

Muderlak says each waterless urinal saves a swimming pool's worth of water a year.

He and a couple colleagues have just a few days to assemble and ship the 270 units. A university in California placed the year-end order to use up the schoo's annual allocation for water conservation projects.

"Each one weighs 50 pounds. Our team is wonderful, they've been great and luckily we're all in pretty good shape," Muderlak says.

Muderlak says selling waterless urinals wasn't part of his business plan. But when he had the opportunity to purchase the license from a Florida company, he couldn't pass it by, being a "seize the moment" kind of guy.

"My number one goal, since I was a kid mowing lawns as a business, was to develop an organization that develops products that are exciting, are recognized," Muderlak says.

Muderlak's inspiration is his father. He was an art teacher, until he discovered design.

Muderlak says his dad came up with designs for everything from bicycle helmets to a sterile cotton dispenser, snatched up by the likes of Trek and Kimberly Clark.

"He became one of most successful designers around. He showed me a successful model on how to build a business and raise a family, even when monies weren't there," Muderlak says.

Seven years ago, armed with a graduate degree in entrepreneurship from UW-Madison and boundless energy, Todd Muderlak joined his father.

"Then three years ago I decided, okay we're ready – we're ready to sell our own products. Enough of this for other companies, let's do it for ourselves," Muderlak says.

Muderlak points to boxes piled high behind him bearing the brand "Purleve" global hygienic products. Each carton contains a hygienic washroom door handle that his father designed.

"This is our first pioneering product which is what we launched in July of 2009," Muderlak says.

Imagine an oversized lock you might use at the gym. Out of the top, sticks a rod covered with a plastic sleeve. Pull it to open the door, and a new plastic sleeve emerges that the next person who opens the door will touch.

The description might sound like a heap of sales bravado, but Popular Science recognized the gizmo as one of 2009's best innovations, and people in other countries have noticed.

"Our markets, actually over 50 percent sales is outside the United States. We have a Purleve office in Antwerp, Belgium. I's sort of like a franchise, but they're paid as they sell," Muderlak says.

Muderlak says hygienic handle sales are hot in countries around the globe, and now with the swine flu scare, orders are picking up in the United States.

The 38 year old says there's no end to the designs in his father's head, but raising capital to bring projects to life is more challenging.

"I"m still working my tail off trying to raise monies from the private standpoint, versus working more with some public monies that I know are out there," Muderlak says.

Muderlak thinks there are plenty of entrepreneurs like him and his father whose projects would fit nicely into Wisconsin's hopes to strengthen green industry.

"Companies like us frankly are doing a lot of innovation and that represents thousands of employees," Muderlak says.

Muderlak has his eyes set on sweeping the world with the next generation of washroom products.

This winter, his dad will tweak the waterless urinal.

"This is a big part of our organization because of the importance of water conservation and how much water actually goes to the washroom," Muderlak says.

Muderlak says the company will roll out more washroom products over the next year.

"A new hand drying product, a new air fragrance product that's going to wow the world. Totally green, no batteries, all you do it add a little water and you're off to the races," Muderlak says.

To View the original article at wuwm.com, please click this link.

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