Quebec company makes it easy to go eco-friendly at home

The story behind Myni Myni started after Founder Marie-Hélène David discovered a hole in her sink.

A Quebec company is making it easier for the everyday person to bring eco-friendly products into their home.

Myni, founded in a small town just outside Quebec City, creates household and personal care items -- including baby products -- in an environmentally-friendly, non-toxic tablet format.

The idea behind Myni came about after founder Marie-Hélène David found a hole in her sink.

She asked her plumber: "My house is new. Why is there a hole in it?"

He responded: "It's because of your cleaning products."

Worried, David thought, "if it's doing that to metal, what is it doing to my health?"

She then sought to create products that would keep her and her young family safe.

As a result, Myni was founded in 2020 -- right at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, an admittedly crazy idea, according to Myni General Manager Frédérique Drouin.

Not only did it change the company's whole business model, it forced them to innovate.

"We started more on the e-commerce side of the business because everything was e-commerce during the pandemic," she explains. "It ended up well for us because we have a perfect product for e-commerce."

Drouin says the goal behind making the products in tablet format was to eliminate plastics completely.

"When we think about it, it makes no sense that each time we use a household or personal product like shampoo, we use a plastic bottle that we throw away when we're done," she said.

She explains that Myni has three chemists who work full-time on formulas for different products.

"It's kind of difficult because you cannot put any liquid ingredients," explains Drouin. "It's a challenge, but we manage, and so we do everything in house; we do all of our research and development ourselves."

Drouin points out that all the packaging, made of corn starch, and the bottles are compostable.

"We were trying to eliminate plastic even if it's recyclable, we wanted to have absolutely no plastic at all for our packaging and all of our products," she tells CTV News. "We did some research on bio-plastic -- it's called bio-plastic, but it's not plastic -- and we found wheat straw."

Wheat straw, Drouin explains, is the waste from the agriculture of wheat.

"It looks almost like plastic, but you have a little grain of wheat in the bottle," she said, adding they can be refilled numerous times. "When you're done with it, it's biodegradable in nine months. So, it's better for the environment."

Drouin says the goal for Myni's future is to launch as many eco-friendly products as possible -- something made possible following a successful appearance on Dragon's Den.

Since then, Drouin says the company has gained immense popularity and is now moving to a bigger warehouse in order to meet demands.

"We're getting bigger; we do everything from the moment you think about a product, develop it, create the formula, and then move it to production, packaging," she said. "We pack all of the orders ourselves too, so everything from A to Z is done here in Quebec City."

Drouin says Myni is also working to educate people about their impact on the environment.

"We saw that people are not really aware of what they use at home," said Drouin. "It's really hard for the customer to know what's good, what's bad for me... So, we want to help people with that, help people eliminate toxicity from their home."

Myni is certified plastic-neutral, cruelty-free and 1% for the planet.