ZOOM CHAT WITH
S’WELL
FOUNDER, SARAH KAUSS
In March, we met with S’well, Founder, Sarah Kauss.
“Sarah is a consumer products leader with a track record in launching companies, building multi-million dollar successful brands, and assembling high-performance senior leadership teams. She is a successful global entrepreneur, product design expert and has deep experience in partnering with multinational corporations to become more sustainable and meet environmental goals.
Sarah held the position of CEO of S’well for ten years: bootstrapping with $30k of her savings to reach over $100M in revenue. During this time, Sarah created a new category and well-loved brand, helping to make sustainability more mainstream. An early advocate of the importance of ESG, Environmental, Social and Governance, in business, Sarah integrated values and impact within S’well from the start. Today, S'well is a Certified B Corp with a wide range of products that has helped displace more than 4 billion single-use plastic bottles.
Prior to S’well, Sarah was an international real estate developer with a publicly-traded real estate equity investment trust where she spent six years with increasing responsibility leading large international collaborations and partnerships. Sarah started her career in public accounting with EY (formerly Ernst & Young), as a Certified Public Accountant, working in both tax consulting and the auditing function. She provided professional services to public and privately held companies in the technology, consumer products and media sectors.
Sarah regularly shares her lessons learned and most important entrepreneurial moments with the press, including Inc., Fortune, Forbes, Bloomberg, NPR and more. She has been recognized as a Fortune’s “40 Under 40” honoree, EY Entrepreneurial Winning Woman and awarded the Harvard Business School Club of New York's Entrepreneurship Award. Under Sarah’s leadership, S’well was named #1 Fastest-Growing, women-led company by the Women Presidents’ Organization, was honored with the Brand Design award by Inc. magazine and placement on the Inc. 500 List (top 100) of fastest-growing, privately-held companies.
Sarah sits on the UNICEF USA New York Regional Board, is an Entrepreneur in Residence at Harvard Business School and a mentor in the Fortune-State Department Global Mentoring Program. Sarah is a member of the 2018 Class of Henry Crown Fellows and a member of the 2020 Class of Braddock Scholars within the Aspen Global Leadership Network at the Aspen Institute. She earned a BS in accounting from the University of Colorado, Boulder and an MBA from Harvard Business School.”
Source: Sarah’s LinkedIn
