An Interview With Chad Silverstein
Put the customer first — it’s the ‘why’ behind it all. Everything has to start with the customer.
In the world of business and within every industry, there are forward-thinking leaders who go against the status quo and find success. Their courage to take risks, embrace innovation, and inspire collaboration separates them from the competition. Until 2002, Apple’s famous slogan was “Think Different”. This attitude likely helped them become one of the most successful organizations in history. This interview series aims to showcase visionary leaders and their “status quo-breaking” approach to doing business. As part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Mark Rushmore.
Mark Rushmore is co-founder and CCO of SURI (Sustainable Rituals), the most highly-rated sustainable electric toothbrush brand on Trustpilot. He co-founded SURI to radically transform the oral health category, designing an award-winning sonic toothbrush, which sits at the intersection of performance, purpose and design. Prior to SURI, Mark worked at P&G, Kellogg’s, founded and sold a marketing agency.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to get to know you a bit better. Can you tell us your “Origin Story”? Can you tell us the story of how you grew up?
Where to begin? I was born in Brunei and grew up in Aberdeen before attending the University of Edinburgh where I studied History. I’m a qualified skipper, ski instructor, and I’ve also embarked on a number of long cycle tours — from Canada to Mexico and from John o’ Groats to Lands End. I also co-wrote the Rough Guide to Europe on a shoestring and played Chess for Scotland!
Can you give us a glimpse into your journey into this industry and share a story about one of the most significant challenges you faced when you first started out? How did you end up resolving that challenge?
My co-founder, Gyve, and I both worked in the personal care industry for over a decade before deciding to launch SURI. Here we encountered a market oversaturated with unattractive plastic brushes, brimming with excess tech and designed with no regard for our planet. Every toothbrush you’ve ever owned — still exists. Having recently become parents, we had an acute understanding of our world being about more than just ‘us’. It felt like the right time to create something with meaningful impact.
However, this journey was not without its challenges. When we first pitched the concept of a repairable electric toothbrush, 25 different factories laughed at us. “Just sell them a new one,” they said. I was ready to give up, but my co-founder’s persistence prevailed. He didn’t stop knocking on doors until he found a factory willing to go all-in on bringing our vision to life.
Who has been the most significant influence in your business journey, and what is the most significant lesson or insight you have learned from them?
My parents — they built and scaled their own business as I was growing up. The most significant insight was twofold, the power and importance of relationships and that the devil is in the detail. And my wife — confidante, coach, therapist. She’s been there for every high and low with measured and considered questions and ideas. From her I’ve learned to focus on what actions are within my control and to take action towards them.
Can you share a story about something specific that happened early on that you would consider a failure but ended up being a blessing in disguise or ended up being one of the most valuable lessons you had to learn on your own?
When Gyve and I first began working together, it quickly became clear that our personalities and perspectives were quite different, which led to some initial tension. However, once we figured out how to effectively communicate and navigate these differences, our diverse viewpoints became a significant strength and real opportunity for the business.
Leading anything is hard, especially when grappling with a difficult situation where it seems that no matter what you decide, it will have a negative impact on those around you. Can you share a story about a situation you faced that required making a “hard call” or a tough decision between two paths?
Deciding where to manufacture our toothbrush presented something of a crossroads. China was the most practical choice, but because most of our business is in the UK and US, it raised some sustainability concerns. We initially explored manufacturing solutions in Europe but found that many raw materials and pre-made components would still be shipped from China, resulting in a significantly larger carbon footprint overall. So we took the decision to produce our brushes in China, while partnering with ClimatePartner to measure, reduce and offset 100% of our emissions, including those from manufacturing and transportation. Although we understand carbon offsetting is not a perfect solution, we believe it’s an important step in the right direction.
Let’s shift our focus to the core of this interview about ‘Successful Rule Breakers’. Why did you decide to “break the rules”? Early on, did you identify a particular problem or issue in how businesses in your industry generally operated? What specifically compelled you to address this and want to do things differently? Please share how you went about implementing those changes and the impact they had.
For too long the oral care industry has been built on disposability, crowded with unattractive, single-use products. Early in our journey we discovered that in the US alone, 1 billion toothbrushes are thrown away each year, ending up in landfill or polluting our oceans. Toothbrushes aren’t being designed with the planet — or the customer — in mind. With bulky bodies, bloated with superfluous features, made to be thrown away and replaced in a couple years.
We could see from the rise in bamboo toothbrushes that customers wanted more sustainable options, but dentists still unanimously recommend electric toothbrushes as they provide a better clean. So we surveyed thousands of consumers to establish the true needs of the market and set out to create a toothbrush that equally champions performance, design and sustainability.
In the ever-changing business landscape, how exactly do you decide when to adhere to industry norms versus “breaking the rules” and forging your own way? Can you share an example?
In the case of SURI, our answer is a lot more straightforward. The landscape of the oral care industry hadn’t changed in decades, so just about every rule was crying out to be broken.
We knew we had to completely rethink the electric toothbrush from the ground up. So we created an elegant, durable alternative, using renewable plant-based materials — making sure it provided a powerful clean while being genuinely enjoyable to use every day. Existing production infrastructure was reluctant to change, so we really had no choice but to come up with our own solutions and forge our own path.
While there are many fast-changing industries, there are plenty that are in desperate need of a brave disrupter to shake things up and find a totally new direction. It’s about spotting the opportunity and taking it.
What guidance or insight can you offer to new entrepreneurs trying to follow existing and accepted industry norms while at the same time trying to differentiate themselves in the marketplace?
Try to think less about what’s been done before, or how you can be different — instead, work towards building something the customer actually wants. You’ll hit countless walls with production partners, but don’t give up until you’ve created a ‘minimum loveable product’. It’s important that people love an aspect of your product. A minimum viable product is no longer good enough to travel. It needs to delight your core audience so they naturally want to share your product.
To make an impact, you have to champion change, get creative, and take risks. Please think back about the decisions you’ve made that have helped your business get to where it is today, and share your top 5 strategies or decisions that helped you succeed by doing things differently.
1 . Put the customer first — it’s the ‘why’ behind it all. Everything has to start with the customer.
2 . Focus on growing as profitably as you can — build strong foundations as you go.
3 . Hire exceptional talent — startups aren’t made by two founders. Your team is everything.
4 . Negotiate everything — nurture relationships, know your value and find mutually beneficial solutions.
5 . Renegotiate everything!
As a leader, how do you rally others to align with your vision? Also, how do you identify those who may not be fully committed or even silently sabotaging or undermining your efforts? What steps do you take to address these situations?
Prevention is sometimes the best cure. Although the company has grown rapidly, we’ve been very choiceful with our recruiting strategy — really taking the time to make sure all our hires are a great cultural fit and truly buy into our company vision. As a result, we’ve managed to create a thriving team who really champion our brand and we trust to deliver on our goals.
On a day-to-day level, Gyve and I try to lead by example and set the tone we want to see. We believe we’ve created a safe and inclusive environment where if people have any doubts or questions about our vision, they feel empowered to speak up.
Imagine we’re sitting down together two years from now, looking back at your company’s last 24 months. What specific accomplishments would have to happen for you to be happy with your progress?
Ultimately, I’d like to look back and see that we’ve grown substantially as a company, while still maintaining (and improving) the high standards we hold ourselves to today. Whether that’s launching new sustainable innovations, improving our B Corp score or maintaining our industry-leading customer happiness levels.
You are a person of enormous influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
Our name SURI stands for Sustainable Rituals and our goal is to create a lifestyle brand that encourages more sustainable living through personal care products that are both thoughtfully designed and enjoyable to use. We’re already seeing a growing movement of customers who genuinely love using their SURI toothbrush every day, and we’re hoping this will catalyze change across the oral care industry as a whole.
How can our readers continue to follow you or your company online?
- Website URL: https://www.trysuri.com/en-us
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/discoversuri/
- TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@discoversuri
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/sustainablerituals/
Thank you so much for sharing all of these insights. We wish you continued success and good health!
About the Interviewer: Chad Silverstein, a seasoned entrepreneur with over two decades of experience as the Founder and CEO of multiple companies. He launched Choice Recovery, Inc., a healthcare collection agency, while going to The Ohio State University, His team earned national recognition, twice being ranked as the #1 business to work for in Central Ohio. In 2018, Chad launched [re]start, a career development platform connecting thousands of individuals in collections with meaningful employment opportunities, He sold Choice Recovery on his 25th anniversary and in 2023, sold the majority interest in [re]start so he can focus his transition to Built to Lead as an Executive Leadership Coach. Learn more at www.chadsilverstein.com
Successful Rule Breakers: Mark Rushmore & SURI On How To Succeed By Doing Things Differently was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.