Welcome to Thirsties Featured Product Day! Following is an interview with one of the co-owners of this wonderful little company. Take your time and enjoy their story :)
1. Tell us a little about your company and how it started.
Erin Kimmett, the founder, became infatuated with the sewing machine and all its wonders beginning at a very young age. Her grandmother, Pearl, was a truly gifted craftswoman and eventually become a local celebrity in her artful expressions. Pearl's father passed away when she was just a baby leaving she and her mother to fend for themselves in a poverty-stricken tenement of New York City. Pearl was taught to sew professionally alongside learning her ABCs and tying her shoes. Though Pearl was only a child, she and her mother worked tirelessly together as sewers for a large clothing manufacturing company to try and make ends meet. Despite the fact that she was forced to sew in lieu of a formal education in order to keep bread on the table for herself, Pearl was enamored with the needle and thread and all the limitless possibilities of creativity it provided. As an adult, she continued to sew for both hobby and profession. Never was she seen without a needle and thread in her hand. In due time, she graciously passed along her gift and her unquenchable thirst for creativity and sewing to her granddaughter, Erin.
Pearl has since passed, but her love for sewing is still expressed in Thirsties Cloth Diapers today. As a new cloth diapering mom herself, Erin couldn’t find a diaper cover that quite suited the needs of her baby, and therefore set out to create her own design of waterproof wraps. The first covers were patterned, cut, and sewn on her dining room table with her secondhand sewing machine and went through several tweaks over the course of 18 months before they were finally released! It was a painstaking process, but all the hard work and innovation paid off and resulted in one of the best selling diaper covers on the market today.
Since May of 2010 Thirsties has been owned by my father and me. We had been looking for looking for an environmentally-friendly business in an positively trending industry to acquire. After 9 months of searching, we were extremely excited to find Thirsties. It was in an industry that we genuinely believed in and immediately recognized that the company had a lot of positive momentum. We feel fortunate to be involved with such a great company in such a wonderful industry.
2. What would you like our readers to know about your company and your mission?The mission of Thirsties, Inc. is to make it easy and affordable for every family to choose cloth while simultaneously investing in our local economy and sustainable business practices.
We are committed to building our business in a sustainable manner by focusing on the health of our babies and the environment. Only the best USA-sourced components are chosen for our products in order to reduce our carbon footprint, to help support domestic textile mills and our local economy, and to ensure that Thirsties diapers will last wash after wash. We are committed to creating only the highest quality products and dedicated to providing exceptional design and unparalleled performance while saving you money.
We are very proud of the fact that all Thirsties products are USA-made by a group of very talented women, many of whom work in the comfort and convenience of their own homes. With your support, we are able to employ more staff each year, helping to support more families in our local community.
3. Tell us about some of the products you offer and their benefitsWe are probably best known for our wraps or covers, but some of our other products are really exciting too. Below are a few other notable products:
Duo Diapers: a two piece diaper system that has 5 layers of hemp/cotton blend and 2 layers of microfiber terry, seven thirsty absorbent layers in all. The ultra-soft microfleece liner on the inside protects baby’s skin from wetness and also resists staining. The duo openings featured in Thirsties Duo Diaper enable easy insert stuffing from either side of the diaper and also make for easy cleaning
Duo Fab Fitteds: our very popular fitted diaper crafted from stretchy, buttery soft textiles, and the internal soaker is composed of spongy, microfiber terry that can absorb up to seven times its weight in liquid. Our Tunnel design allows for stuffing additional absorbency when needed, better washing and quicker drying.
Duo Hemp Prefolds: we think we are revolutionizing the most widely used cloth diaper in the world. Ordinary prefolds are bulky and take a long time to dry. Thirsties Duo Hemp Prefolds are designed for the freer flow of air and washing water-each panel is only 2 layers thick, permitting thorough cleansing with little effort and quick drying times. Our custom hemp jersey is as soft as your favorite t-shirt and it's knitted with love right here in the USA. Hemp is an ideal diaper fabric as it displays antimicrobial properties, is many times more durable, and is more absorbent than cotton. This translates into a very trim and effective cloth diaper with a hefty amount of absorbing power.
We are always working on new prints and products. We will be launching a few new products in the next couple months. Please follow our blog at thirstiesbaby.com or like us on Facebook to stay up to date on our latest and greatest.
Thank you,
Sadler Merrill
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